Two passenger trains derailed in India on Friday, killing more than 200 people and leaving Hundreds more trapped inside more than a dozen damaged carriages, officials reported.
The crash that occurred some 220 kilometers (137 miles) southwest of Kolkata created a chaotic scene of twisted wreckage and rescuers desperate to free the passengers and recover the bodies. The cause was being investigated.
Fire chief Sudhanshu Sarangi told the Press Trust of India news agency that more than 800 people were injuredand warned that the number of deaths is likely to increase.
10 to 12 passenger cars of a train derailedand twisted debris from some of the carriages fell onto a nearby track, said Amitabh Sharma, spokesman for the railway ministry.
A passenger train coming from the opposite direction collided with the debris, and up to three wagons of this second train they also went off the rails, Sharma added.
A third train carrying cargo was also involved, the Press Trust reported, but the railway authorities had not confirmed this. In its report, the news agency noted that some of derailed passenger carriages hit carriages of freight railway.
The death toll continued to rise throughout the night. At dawn, the top official in the eastern state of Odisha announced that at least 207 people had been killed.
In television footage, rescuers could be seen climbing onto the rubble to break open doors and windows, using torches to free survivors.
Passenger Vandana Kaleda told the New Delhi Television news channel that he saw “people falling on top of others” when his carriage shook violently and went off the tracks. She considered herself lucky to have survived.
Another survivor, who did not give his name, said he was asleep when the impact woke him up. He said he saw other passengers with broken limbs and disfigured faces.
Nearly 500 police officers and rescue personnelwith 75 ambulances and buses, rushed to the scene, said Pradip Jena, the senior official of the state of Odisha.