Odisha train accident: 288 dead, over 1,100 injured; preliminary report states 'signal was given and taken off'

Investigators were on Saturday looking into any human error, signal failure and other possible causes behind the three-train crash in Odisha's Balasore district as officials submitted a preliminary inquiry report into the worst rail accident in India in nearly three decades that left at least 288 people dead and over 1,100 injured.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the accident site and was briefed by Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw as well as officers of the disaster management teams. He also met some of the injured in the hospital.

"I do not have words to express my pain... No one would be spared and strong action would be taken against those found guilty. Instructions have been given to ensure proper and speedy investigation into the tragedy," Modi said, adding that more focus will be given to the security of rail passengers.

The crash involving Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Express and Shalimar-Chennai Central Coromandel Express, which were carrying around 2,500 passengers, and a goods train occurred around 7 PM o Friday near the Bahanaga Bazar station in Balasore, about 250 km south of Kolkata and 170 km north of Bhubaneswar.

Twenty-one coaches were derailed and severely damaged in the accident, trapping hundreds of passengers. Both passenger trains were at a high speed and it has been cited by experts as one of the main reasons for the high number of casualties.

From a vantage point high above the ground, the disaster site looked as if a powerful whirlwind had thrown the coaches like toys on top of each other. Closer to the ground, bloodied, disfigured bodies and dismembered body parts lay enmeshed, creating a grotesque sight.

Large cranes were deployed to move the wreckage and gas cutters were used to extricate the bodies from the mangled, toppled coaches.

The rescue operation was wrapped up Saturday afternoon and restoration work started. With traffic on the route disrupted, over 150 trains were cancelled, diverted or short-terminated.

Preliminary investigations have revealed that a signal was given to Coromandel Express to enter the main line but it was taken off and the train entered the loop line and crashed into a goods train parked there.
The Bengaluru-Howrah Superfast Express which was coming at high speed rammed into the coaches of Coromandel Express that had scattered on the adjacent track.

Citing reports till Saturday evening, officials said 288 people were killed in the accident.

As many as 1,175 people were admitted at various hospitals, including private ones, out of which 793 have been released and 382 were undergoing treatment, Odisha government officials said at around 8 PM Saturday. All except two patients are stable, they said.

Shocked survivors recalled their brush with death, while families in several states including West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Odisha underwent a painful wait to know the fate of their loved ones.

"The train was running at a high speed. Around 7 PM, a loud sound was heard and it was chaos after that. I fell on the floor from the upper berth. It was ghastly, many people with grave injuries were lying around," Mizan Ul Haq, a resident of Bardhaman in West Bengal who was in a coach at the rear of the Howrah Superfast Express train, told PTI.

Another Bardhaman resident, a carpenter who works in Bengaluru, said he was injured in the chest, feet and head when the coach in which he was travelling turned turtle. "We had to break open the windows and jump out of the compartment to save ourselves," he said, adding he saw many bodies after the accident.

The unreserved compartments were packed, carrying mostly migrant workers to Tamil Nadu or Kerala, according to survivors.

Nityam Ray, a resident of Bhomrail village in West Bengal's Malda district, was also killed in the accident. He was travelling on the Coromandel Express, his family said. Ray, 30, called his wife moments after he boarded the train from the Shalimar station in Howrah district. "That was the last time I spoke to him," she said.

The Balasore district hospital and Soro hospital looked like a war zone as the injured were rushed in. More than 2,000 people gathered at the Balasore Medical College and Hospital at night to help the injured and many of them donated blood, officials said.

The morgue at the hospital was overflowing with shrouded bodies and was thronged by distraught relatives of passengers but many victims remained unidentified.

As the nation mourned the massive tragedy, several states and parties cancelled their programmes and condolences poured in from across the world. Expressing shock and grief at the tragic train accident, opposition leaders stressed the importance of prioritising the safety of passengers by railways, while there were also demands to fix accountability and for the resignation of Railway Minister Vaishnaw.

While questions were raised on why the anti-train collision system "Kavach" did not work, the railways said it was not available on the route.

On June 6, 1981, India recorded its worst train accident in Bihar when a train fell into the river Bagmati while crossing a bridge, killing more than 750 people. In August 1995, around 350 people were killed when two passenger trains collided in Firozabad in Uttar Pradesh.