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Accident in Egypt: collision between two trains leaves more than 30 dead

2021-03-26T22:10:28.992Z


At least 32 people were killed and 108 injured in an accident in Egypt, where two passenger trains collided on Friday.


The accident happened after a person activated an emergency brake on one of the trains.

(CNN) -

At least 32 people were killed and 108 injured after two trains collided in Egypt on Friday, according to government statements.

Seventy-two ambulances were dispatched to the crash site in the Tahta district of Sohag governorate in Upper Egypt, as well as backup medical teams from the capital Cairo, the Health Ministry said.

Images from the scene showed crowds of people gathered around the wreckage of the trains.

Wagons damaged after the collision between passenger trains near Tahta.

The crash happened after an unidentified person activated an emergency brake, Egypt's railway authority said in a statement.

The agency said at 11:42 a.m. local time (5:42 a.m. ET) a train heading from Aswan to Cairo collided with the back of a train heading from Luxor to Alexandria, which got stuck in the track after the emergency brake was activated.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said that "whoever caused the Sohag train accident will receive dissuasive punishment."

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Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly added that "no mistake or negligence will be tolerated, and the perpetrator will be held responsible for the accident."

Dozens of people died in the accident.

Egypt has a long history of train accidents

Egypt's aging rail system has seen fatal accidents almost every year for the past two decades.

In 2018, Egypt recorded 2,044 train accidents and in 2017 there were 1,793 accidents, according to data released by the official Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS).

Two years ago, at least 25 people were killed and dozens injured in a fire at the Ramses station in central Cairo, the busiest in the country, after a train collided with the platform and its fuel tank exploded.

A collision between two trains in Alexandria, Egypt's second-largest city, left more than 40 people dead and many more injured in August 2017.

In 2012, 44 children died after a train collided with a school bus in Assyut governorate.

However, the deadliest accident in Egypt's railway history happened in 2012, when a fire on a passenger train traveling from Cairo to Luxor killed more than 360 people.

CNN's Mostafa Salem reported from Abu Dhabi, and Magdy Samaan and Lina Wardani from Cairo.

Source: cnnespanol

All news articles on 2021-03-26

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