Reports, citing railway officials, said that a possible signalling error had sent the Coromandal Express running south from Kolkata to Chennai onto a side track. It slammed into a freight train and the wreckage derailed an express running north from India’s tech hub Bengaluru to Kolkata that was also passing the site.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the crash site and injured passengers being treated in hospital and said “no one responsible” would be spared.
Whatever be the cause of the accident, it was a tragic coincidence. A railway official told Times of India that if the Bengaluru-Howrah train been running on time, it would have crossed the spot before Coromandel’s derailment. The Coromandel Express was on time but the Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Express was late by over two hours, the official said.
“The death toll would have been a lot lower as only one passenger train would have been involved in the crash with a goods train,” he rued.
The events unfolded so quickly that the driver of the goods train even did not get time to flash the light of his loco, to alert the the driver of the Bengaluru-Howrah train, he added. India has one of the world’s largest rail networks. Friday’s crash ranks as its third-worst, and the deadliest since 1995, when two express trains collided in Firozabad, near Agra, killing more than 300 people. In worst of the Railway disasters in India, in 1981 when a train derailed while crossing a bridge in Bihar and plunged into the river below, killing between 800 and 1,000 people.Condolences have poured in from around the world. US President Joe Biden on Saturday said he is heartbroken by the tragic news of a train crash in India “Jill and I are heartbroken by the tragic news of the deadly train crash in India. Our prayers go out to those who have lost loved ones and the many who suffered injuries in this terrible incident. The United States and India share deep bonds rooted in the ties of family and culture that unite our two nations—and people all across America mourn alongside the people of India. As the recovery effort continues, we will hold the people of India in our thoughts,” the US President said in a statement. (With Agency Inputs)
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