India faces one of the deadliest rail tragedies on 2nd June 2023 evening when two passenger trains collide near Odisha’s Balasore, killing more than 280 people and injuring hundreds.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who earlier held a meeting with officials in New Delhi, has reach the accident site.
The accident took place when 10 to 12 coaches of Chennai-bound Coromandel Express, carrying passengers from West Bengal, derailed and fell on the opposite track around 7 pm in Balasore.
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The train then collide with a goods train on the loop line and derailed on the main line.
After a while, Howrah Superfast Express, running from Bangalore’s Yeswanthpur to Howrah in West Bengal, slam into the derailed cars of Coromandel Express, leading to three to four of its coaches going off tracks, as per Railways spokesperson Amitabh Sharma.
As many as 900 people were injure in the collision of the two passenger trains.
Survivors recall harrowing stories of the mishap, with one telling that he found people who lost limbs and ‘someone’s face was disfigure’ when he came out of the train.
Rescuers race to help survivors and remove hundreds of bodies from the accident site.
Littered plastic bottles, mangled train wreckage, cloth pieces and passengers’ belongings surround the railway line.
Railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said a high-level probe has order into the mishap.
As per a preliminary investigation by senior railway officials, it seems a “mistaken” signal possibly cause Coromandel Express to enter the line where a freight train was park, as per reports.
Around 250 survivors of the train mishap are on a special train, with the majority schedule to disembark in Chennai.
Railway officials told that as many as 3,400 passengers were travelling in the two ill-fated passenger trains.
Rescue operations are almost complete and restoration work will begin soon to remove the debris to repair the track and restart rail operations, the Railroad Ministry spokesperson said.
Tragically, train accidents are not uncommon in India, with derailments causing most of these mishaps.
As per the latest National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) report, more than 16000 casualties were reported in 2021 due to 17,993 railway accidents.
India is mourning one of the country’s biggest rail accidents in decades.
Experts say such disasters can be avoide if the government takes appropriate measures, including upgrading infrastructure.
