At least 4 people were killed and 30 others injured on Friday, in Germany, in the derailment of a regional train in the Bavarian Alps, not far from the place where the summit of G7 leaders will be held at the end of the month.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz spoke surprising newsexpressing his support for the victims and their loved ones, while the boss of the German railway company Deutsche Bahn Richard Lutz, said he was excited.
Shortly after leaving the Garmisch-Partenkirchen mountain station, several train carriages to Munich disappeared on the railroad at the height of the municipality of Burgrain.
Fifteen injured had to be taken to hospitals in the region, said Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann, who went there.
One woman, seriously injured, died while being taken to a hospital. The other three dead were trapped under a train, he added, adding that other bodies could be discovered.
Aid was also sent from neighboring Austria and six helicopters were mobilized, according to continuous news channel n-tv.
A busy train
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser must attend despite storms and heavy rain in the area.
A local police spokesman, Stefan Sonntag, clarified on television that the regional train was too busy and many people used it, so the number of injured was high.
Photos published by German media showed that the train was almost derailed, with red carriages with the Deutsche Bahn logo and the Regio inscription lying in a woods at the foot of the mountains and along a national road.
The victims were treated at the place of doctors.
Firefighters, equipped with ladders, rescuers and police walked to the wagons to try to reach the injured and evacuate them.
Some local media mentioned the large influx of students returning home before the feast of Pentecost that begins this Friday in Bavaria. But the police spokesman for Upper Bavaria South could not confirm or deny these allegations.
Technical problems either on the train or on the railroad
The cause of the accident is unknown at this stage. But on Bavarian public radio, the region’s transport minister Christian Bernreiter spoke of a likely technical problems whether on the train or on the railroad and excluded any malicious act.
The accident occurred about ten kilometers from the venue where the G7 leaders ’summit will be held from June 26 to 28, scheduled for the 5-star Elmau Castle complex.
This bucolic and mountainous region attracts many tourists every year who enjoy winter sports and summer walks in the Bavarian mountains.
Police and soldiers deployed to prepare and secure the area before the summit were reassigned to participate in the relief operation.
This accident comes two days after the entry into force of a monthly fixed price of 9 euros allowing to ride on regional trains across Germany, an offer that has attracted many Germans and raised fears of congestion on trains.
There are many sites in the network
With the launch of this extraordinary subscription, the managers of the national company Deutsche Bahn are worried about tensions with the railway network in full overhaul, after years of underinvestment.
There have always been so many construction sites on the German rail network as there are todaydescribed earlier this week the German rail boss, explaining that this situation, and the increase in traffic, is the cause of incidents and an unusual frequency of delays.
The deadliest train accident in Germany occurred in 1998, when a high-speed train derailed in Eschede, Lower Saxony, killing 101 people.
Last February, one person was killed and 14 others were injured in a collision between two local trains near Munich, Bavaria.
Source: Radio-Canada
