UTTAR, India (CCTV) — At least 23 people were killed and over 90 others injured after a passenger train derailed in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh on Saturday.
According to an Indian railway spokesperson, 14 coaches of the train derailed during the accident, which took place in Muzaffarnagar district of Uttar Pradesh, around 100 kilometers from New Delhi, India’s national capital.
One derailed coach hit a nearby house, causing a huge amount of damage to the property.
Following the incident, locals first rushed to the scene to help people trapped in the derailed coaches and subsequently informed the police and railway officials.
“I was on the roof when I heard a huge noise. I ran to the site and saw the coaches overturned and the passengers calling loudly for help, so I gave them a hand. Then nearby villagers also rushed here to rescue the injured passengers. We rescued more than 40 passengers, I think there were at least 100 people injured,” said Mohanmod Hansari, a local villager.
The accident caused major delays and suspensions of many trains.
The workers have been busy repairing the tracks in efforts to recover normal traffic flow as soon as possible.
“It’s because there was a number of coaches involved and there were many coaches which had got entangled with each other. So you see the situation was definitely challenging, but at the same time, since yesterday, the whole team is here. So we expect that we will be able to restore traffic before the end of the day,” said Arun Arora, a mechanical engineer.
Authorities quickly sent out police and a disaster response unit to the scene to carry out rescue work. A crane was brought to the area to lift the derailed coaches.
The injured people were sent to a nearby hospital for treatment.
Conflicting claims from officials indicated that a human error may have been the cause of the accident.
This is not the first time that such a fatal accident has taken place.
Official statistics reveal over 580 train mishaps, both minor and major, took place in the past five years in India, out of which more than 50 percent occurred due to derailments.
The worst accident occurred on November 20, 2016, when an express train from the central state of Madhya Pradesh to the eastern state of Bihar’s capital Patna derailed near Kanpur city in Uttar Pradesh, claiming the lives of around 150 people.
