At least 27 dead as two trains derail on a bridge in India
NEW DELHI: At least twenty-seven people died and 100 others injured Tuesday when two crowded express trains derail while crossing a bridge submerged by recent floods in India’s Madhya Pradeh state, according to official sources.
Rescue teams have been trying all night to clear the stranded passengers on these two trains, going in opposite directions when some of their carriages derailed in the state of Madhya Pradesh.
Some 300 people were rescued after the trains had derailed just minutes apart, around 11:30 p.m. local (1800 GMT), said police and other officials.
“Twenty-seven people died in accidents,” said state railway police chief M S Gupta.
All of the carriages were cleared and all the bodies were extracted,” he said, adding that the death toll could rise slightly.
At least 25 passengers were injured and taken to hospital, announced other local officials, adding that the convoy had not fallen into the river despite the derailment.
A train, from the commercial capital Mumbai, appeared to have been hit by a sudden increase in the level of Machak river. The four or five trailing carriages derailed, said a spokesman for the Minister of rail networks, Anil Saxena, the Indian television.
The other passenger train, which was traveling from Patna (East) in Mumbai, was also affected by the swollen river. The locomotive and the first two or three carriages derailed, according to the spokesman.
The monsoon rains have hit many parts of the country in recent weeks, killing nearly 180 people during floods in western and eastern India.
Train accidents in an overloaded, aging rail network killed more than 25,000 last year in India. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced this year a massive increase in network modernization investments, but the upgrade will take years.
