ATHENS – Twenty-six individuals had been killed and a minimum of 85 injured after two trains collided head-on in Greece late on Tuesday evening, the fireplace brigade mentioned, whereas the circumstances of the crash remained unclear.
An intercity passenger prepare touring from Athens to the northern metropolis of Thessaloniki collided with a cargo prepare exterior the town of Larissa in central Greece, mentioned the governor of the Thessaly area.
“The collision was very strong,” governor Konstantinos Agorastos advised SKAI TV, including the primary 4 carriages of the passenger prepare had derailed.
The first two carriages, which caught fireplace after the collision, had been “almost completely destroyed,” mentioned Agorastos.
About 250 passengers had been evacuated safely to Thessaloniki on buses. One passenger advised state broadcaster ERT he managed to flee after breaking the prepare window along with his suitcase.
“There was panic in the carriage, people were screaming,” a younger man who was evacuated to a close-by bridge advised SKAI TV.
“It was like an earthquake,” Angelos Tsiamouras, one other passenger, advised ERT.
Broadcaster SKAI confirmed footage of derailed carriages, badly broken with damaged home windows and thick plumes of smoke, in addition to particles strewn throughout the street. Rescue employees had been seen carrying torches in carriages in search of trapped passengers.
“The evacuation of passengers is under way in very difficult conditions given the severity of the collision of the two trains,” fireplace brigade spokesperson Vassilis Varthakogiannis mentioned in a televised tackle.
In the early hours of Wednesday, footage from state broadcaster ERT confirmed rescue employees with headlights looking out the wreckage and surrounding fields for survivors.
Local media reported about 350 individuals had been touring on the passenger prepare, which departed Athens round 19:30 native time (0530 GMT). The fireplace brigade mentioned it was knowledgeable of the accident shortly earlier than midnight on Tuesday. The cargo prepare had been touring from Thessaloniki to Larissa.
The passenger prepare is operated by the Italian group Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, which based on its web site is the primary supplier of rail transport for passengers and freight in Greece and runs 342 passenger and business routes a day. —Reuters
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
