A man yesterday set himself on fire on board a moving Shinkansen bullet train in Japan, killing himself and one other person, in an unprecedented incident on a network with an enviable safety record.
Several other passengers had to be treated for smoke inhalation after the man doused himself in flammable liquid and lit a cigarette lighter on the train as it hurtled through the countryside about 70km southwest of Tokyo.
“At the very front of the first carriage ... this person had a whole gasoline container, and sprayed liquid across the seats ... and then all over himself. And then set himself on fire,” a woman passenger told broadcaster TBS. “And fire spread all over the place immediately.”
Photo: Reuters
The Yomiuri Shimbun daily said a blast was heard from a toilet stall at the front of the train, filling the front carriage with choking white smoke, and triggering an emergency stop.
Media reported that the driver of the 300train, which had about 1,000 passengers on board, found the still-burning body of the man after the emergency stop.
“We have been informed that there was a passenger in a car on the train who covered him or herself with oil and set it on fire,” a spokesman for operator JR Central said.
TBS footage showed a train carriage filled with smoke and passengers scrambling to get out, pressing handkerchiefs to their faces. One clutched a baby to the chest.
Other television pictures showed all the doors on the stationary train open and passengers being carried out on stretchers.
NHK reported the two dead were found on the floor of the front car, but at opposite ends of the carriage.
Broadcaster NTV said the dead man was 71 years old, while local officials said the other deceased was a woman.
An official at the local disaster prevention office said one man remained in a serious condition, while three others were badly hurt.
Fire department officials said 26 other passengers were also hurt in the incident, affected by heat, smoke and other causes.
The train involved in the incident — a super-fast Nozomi bullet train — was traveling from Tokyo toward Osaka, when the blaze erupted near Odawara, southwest of the capital.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe set up a task force to respond to the incident, his office said, and all bullet trains running between Tokyo and Nagoya were suspended.
Additional reporting by Reuters
CONDITIONS: The Russian president said a deal that was scuppered by ‘elites’ in the US and Europe should be revived, as Ukraine was generally satisfied with it Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday said that he was ready for talks with Ukraine, after having previously rebuffed the idea of negotiations while Kyiv’s offensive into the Kursk region was ongoing. Ukraine last month launched a cross-border incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, sending thousands of troops across the border and seizing several villages. Putin said shortly after there could be no talk of negotiations. Speaking at a question and answer session at Russia’s Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Putin said that Russia was ready for talks, but on the basis of an aborted deal between Moscow’s and Kyiv’s negotiators reached in Istanbul, Turkey,
SPIRITUAL COUPLE: Martha Louise has said she can talk with angels, while her husband, Durek Verrett, claims that he communicates with a broad range of spirits Social media influencers, reality stars and TV personalities were among the guests as the Norwegian king’s eldest child, Princess Martha Louise, married a self-professed US shaman on Saturday in a wedding ceremony following three days of festivities. The 52-year-old Martha Louise and Durek Verrett, who claims to be a sixth-generation shaman from California, tied the knot in the picturesque small town of Geiranger, one of Norway’s major tourist attractions located on a fjord with stunning views. Following festivities that started on Thursday, the actual wedding ceremony took place in a large white tent set up on a lush lawn. Guests
Four days after last scanning in for work, a 60-year-old office worker in Arizona was found dead in a cubicle at her workplace, having never left the building during that time, authorities said. Denise Prudhomme, who worked at a Wells Fargo corporate office, was found dead in a third-floor cubicle on Aug. 20, Tempe police said. She had last scanned into the building on Aug. 16 at 7am, police said. There was no indication she scanned out of the building after that. Prudhomme worked in an underpopulated area of the building. Her cause of death had not been determined, but police said the preliminary
‘DISCONNECTED’: Politics is one factor driving news avoidance, a professor said, adding that people who do not trust the government are more likely to tune it out Hannah Wong cried when the Hong Kong government effectively forced the territory’s Apple Daily and Stand News out of business three years ago. Among the last news firms in the territory willing to criticize the government openly, many saw their end as a sign that the old Hong Kong was gone for good. Today, the 35-year-old makeup artist says she has gone from reading the news every day to reducing her intake drastically to protect herself from despair. Four years into a crackdown on dissent that has swept up democracy-leaning journalists, rights advocates and politicians in the territory, a lot of people
RSS