Deadly Belgian Train CRASH

[Nictoshek]

Belgian train crash 'kills 25'

• Rush-hour passenger trains collide head on near Halle
• Eurostar services to Brussels suspended until further notice

James Sturcke and agencies
Monday 15 February 2010

Up to 25 people were feared killed when two rush-hour passenger trains collided head on in Belgium today, railway officials said.

The commuter trains collided at Buizingen, near Halle, around nine miles south-west of Brussels, at around 8.30am local time.

The Belgian broadacaster VRT showed footage of firefighters carrying casualties from the wreckage of the two trains, which had concertinaed on impact. A man carrying a small child in his arms was also visible.

Pictures of the crash site posted on Twitter showed the front of the trains ended up suspended around 3 metres above the ground.

One passenger interviewed described "a violent shock" when the trains impacted.

TV pictures showed emergency workers trying to rescue people from the mangled carriages as snow fell.

Belgian National Railways told VRT 25 people had died. The Halle mayor, Dirk Pieters, said police and firefighters had told him that the death toll was 20. Lodewijk De Witte, governor of the province of Flemish Brabant, told VRT 10 people had been killed.

The crash caused major rail disruption in and out of Brussels. Eurostar said its London-Brussels services were suspended until further notice.

The international high-speed network Thalys, which links major cities in Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands, temporarily halted all traffic because its trains use the same rails as commuter lines near Halle, said Patricia Baars, a company spokeswoman.

The rail track operator Infrabel said the two trains had crashed head on. One train was travelling from Leuven to Braine-le-Comte. The second train was on its way from Quiévrain to Liège

Kristien Berckmans, a Belgian railways spokeswoman, said earlier that "there was considerable damage and several people were injured".

VRT reported some victims were in hospital and others were being treated at a nearby sports complex.

Snow showers were predicted in Brussels, where temperatures were close to freezing.

There were no immediate reports of what had caused the crash.

Rail traffic from Brussels to south-western Belgium was halted .

At least four Thalys trains were stopped en route, and the railway operator deployed staff to stations where they were rerouted to provide assistance to travellers on board, she said.

"No [Thalys] train is moving for the moment ... it's very hard to know today when services will resume," the spokeswoman said. "It appears this was a very severe accident."

Thalys has at least 25 round-trip trains operating between Paris and Brussels each day, plus seven linking Brussels and Amsterdam and six from Belgium to Cologne, Germany.

Link to this video:

www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2010/feb/15/belgium-train-crash

[pieter]

Many killed in Belgium train crash



The two commuter trains collided just outside of Brussels during rush hour [Reuters]



At least 20 people are believed to have been killed in a train crash outside Brussels, the Belgian capital, officials have said.

Two packed commuter trains collided head-on at rush hour near Halle, 15km southwest of Brussels at around 07:30 GMT on Monday.

A provincial governor confirmed that 12 people had died and another 55 were injured but other officials put the death toll as high as 25.

"There are certainly deaths, but it's very difficult to give a precise number at this point. There are people trapped inside," a spokesman for SNCB, the national railways company, told Reuters.

An unnamed passenger described the collision as "brutal", saying one of the trains did not brake.

"Wagons have been turned over, lots of people are in shock," the passenger told by the RTL TV news website.

'People were screaming'

Hambaoui Mounir, a 37-year-old passenger, told the Reuters news agency that the "first two carriages were completely squashed".

"I was in the carriage right behind. The train fell to one side, people fell over each other, there was no air and women and children were screaming."


"Clearly something went very very wrong here. The heads of the trains are crushed into each other like tinfoil"

Terri Schultz
Local journalist



Dirk Pieters, mayor of Halle, told Flemish public television VRT that there were "at least 20 dead".

"All the emergency services are there. The most seriously injured are being treated at the scene before being taken to hospital," the mayor added.

Pieters said the seriously hurt were taken to hospitals and the lightly injured were moved to a sports complex.

There was no immediate word on the cause of the crash.

But Lodewijk De Witte, the governor of the province where the crash occured, said one train "apparently did not heed a stop light".

Terri Schultz, a local journalist, told Al Jazeera that locals were shocked by the incident.

"Clearly something went very very wrong here. The heads of the trains are crushed into each other like tinfoil."

She said Belgium's train safety record was very good.

"Things are very orderly in Belgium. I've lived here three years and I've never heard of anything like this.

"I think everyone is shocked. And this wasn't just rush hour it was the busiest commuter line going into Brussels."

Railway authorities said the accident also caused great damage to overhead power lines in the station.

Train services, including the high-speed line between Brussels and Paris, have been suspended for the day. Eurostar said its services to Britain were also not running.

Monday's crash is the most serious Belgian train accident since March 2001, when
eight people died when a crowded train ploughing into an empty train driving on the wrong tracks.