A high-tech train traveling at 200kph crashed in northwestern Germany on Friday, killing at least 23 people in the first fatal wreck involving the magnetic levitation system.
The train, which runs primarily as a demonstration by its manufacturer, was carrying at least 29 people when it struck a maintenance vehicle carrying two workers on the elevated track. Mangled wreckage hung from the 4m-high track, with seats and other debris strewn below.
Police spokesman Martin Ratermann said the death toll rose to 23 after more searching was done in and around the train, which crashed about a kilometer from the station at the village of Melstrup. Officials also reported 10 people were injured.
PHOTO: EPA
Magnetic-levitation trains use powerful magnets to float the trains just above the elevated track, allowing them to glide along without friction.
The collision on a 32km track between Doerpen and Lathen near the Dutch border, shattered the front of the train, which came to rest still on its elevated guideway. Rescuers had to use fire ladders and cranes to reach the wreck.
The maintenance car was regularly used to check and clear the tracks of branches and other debris.
Rudolf Schwarz, a spokesman for IABG, which oversees the track, said the accident was the result of human error.
"At this time, the accident was not caused by a technical failure. It is the result of human error," he said.
The Transrapid train is made by Transrapid International, a joint company of Siemens AG and ThyssenKrupp AG. The track is operated by Munich-based IABG mostly as an exhibition aimed at showing off Germany's advanced "maglev" technology, which has been led by ThyssenKrupp AG and Siemens AG.
Aboard the train were Transrapid employees, workers from a home nursing care company and people from local utility RWE. Klaus Schultebraucks, a spokesman for utility RWE Westfalen, confirmed several of the company's workers were aboard but he did not know how many nor if they survived.
"We only know a group of our employees were riding on the train," he said. "We don't have more information."
Schwarz said IABG was still getting the details of the accident.
"We're trying to get as many details as we can," he said, adding that the train, which can reach speeds of as much as 450kph, was travelling at about 200kph.
Tourists can sometimes ride the train for fun, but otherwise it is primarily used for selling Germany's maglev technology.
Kevin Coates, a former spokesman for Transrapid, said it was the first time that he was aware of a crash of a magnetic-levitation train.
"I have to believe that this is not a malfunction of the technology but a communications breakdown" between the operators and the maintenance personnel, he said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel left a conference in Berlin and arrived near the scene by helicopter.
Wearing black, she said her thoughts were with the victims.
"I want to show that I am with them," she said.
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
FALLEN: The nine soldiers who were killed while carrying out combat and engineering tasks in Russia were given the title of Hero of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a welcoming ceremony for an army engineering unit that had returned home after carrying out duties in Russia, North Korean state media KCNA reported on Saturday. In a speech carried by KCNA, Kim praised officers and soldiers of the 528th Regiment of Engineers of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) for “heroic” conduct and “mass heroism” in fulfilling orders issued by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea during a 120-day overseas deployment. Video footage released by North Korea showed uniformed soldiers disembarking from an aircraft, Kim hugging a soldier seated in a wheelchair, and soldiers and officials
‘NO AMNESTY’: Tens of thousands of people joined the rally against a bill that would slash the former president’s prison term; President Lula has said he would veto the bill Tens of thousands of Brazilians on Sunday demonstrated against a bill that advanced in Congress this week that would reduce the time former president Jair Bolsonaro spends behind bars following his sentence of more than 27 years for attempting a coup. Protests took place in the capital, Brasilia, and in other major cities across the nation, including Sao Paulo, Florianopolis, Salvador and Recife. On Copacabana’s boardwalk in Rio de Janeiro, crowds composed of left-wing voters chanted “No amnesty” and “Out with Hugo Motta,” a reference to the speaker of the lower house, which approved the bill on Wednesday last week. It is
Cozy knits, sparkly bobbles and Santa hats were all the canine rage on Sunday, as hundreds of sausage dogs and their owners converged on central London for an annual parade and get-together. The dachshunds’ gathering in London’s Hyde Park came after a previous “Sausage Walk” planned for Halloween had to be postponed, because it had become so popular organizers needed to apply for an events licence. “It was going to be too much fun so they canceled it,” laughed Nicky Bailey, the owner of three sausage dogs: Una and her two 19-week-old puppies Ember and Finnegan, wearing matching red coats and silver
RSS