Cause sought in Brussels rail crash
Source: Agencies |
February 17, 2010, Wednesday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
ONE train driver survived the head-on crash that killed at least 18 people outside of Brussels and will be questioned as soon as his serious injuries permit it, railway officials said yesterday as the search resumed for more victims.
The Eurostar and Thalys high speed trains from London and Paris to Brussels were suspended for a second day yesterday and other train drivers held a wildcat strike that paralyzed train travel across southern Belgium.
Rescue workers picked through the wreckage of the two commuter trains that collided on Monday in one of the deadliest rail accidents in Belgian history.
In addition to the deaths, officials said 171 people were injured, some seriously.
National Railways spokesman Jochen Goovaerts said investigators will examine the black boxes of the two trains to try to determine whether mechanical failure, human error, freezing weather or another factor was primarily responsible for the crash near a suburban station 15 kilometers south of Brussels.
The black boxes, recording all the technical data of the journeys, should reveal how fast the trains were moving when they collided, said Goovaerts.
"There are a lot of possible explanations to this tragedy," he said.
"We don't want to put the blame where it doesn't belong."
The accident scene was sealed off yesterday with police tape. One passenger car from each train was tipped onto its side, and it was unknown whether more bodies were trapped underneath.
Lodewijk De Witte, the governor of the province of Flemish Brabant, told reporters that one train apparently did not heed a red signal as the second train - leaving 10 minutes late from the station at Buizingen - moved onto the track of the oncoming train.
Goovaerts told reporters that the surviving driver was on the train approaching the station.
Infrabel, the rail management company, said its technical teams would need three days to inspect six rail lines once the wreckage is removed, meaning train traffic was likely to remain disrupted in Brussels for the rest of the week.
Meanwhile, a wildcat strike by about half of Belgium's train drivers paralyzed much of the traffic in the southern part of the country and caused cancellations and delays in the north.
"It was an emotional reaction to the catastrophe of yesterday," Goovaerts said.
Many of the railway employees were outraged at accusations blaming one of the drivers for the accident before an investigation could be concluded, he said.
Infrabel called for the installation of automatic braking systems on all trains. Officials said these would have prevented the accident by immediately activating the brakes on the train that ran the red light at the entrance to the station.
"It was a nightmare," survivor Christian Wampach, 47, said at the crash site. "We were thrown about for about 15 seconds. There were a number of people injured in my car, but I think all the dead were in the first car."
Wampach was in the third car of a Brussels-bound train.
The Eurostar and Thalys high speed trains from London and Paris to Brussels were suspended for a second day yesterday and other train drivers held a wildcat strike that paralyzed train travel across southern Belgium.
Rescue workers picked through the wreckage of the two commuter trains that collided on Monday in one of the deadliest rail accidents in Belgian history.
In addition to the deaths, officials said 171 people were injured, some seriously.
National Railways spokesman Jochen Goovaerts said investigators will examine the black boxes of the two trains to try to determine whether mechanical failure, human error, freezing weather or another factor was primarily responsible for the crash near a suburban station 15 kilometers south of Brussels.
The black boxes, recording all the technical data of the journeys, should reveal how fast the trains were moving when they collided, said Goovaerts.
"There are a lot of possible explanations to this tragedy," he said.
"We don't want to put the blame where it doesn't belong."
The accident scene was sealed off yesterday with police tape. One passenger car from each train was tipped onto its side, and it was unknown whether more bodies were trapped underneath.
Lodewijk De Witte, the governor of the province of Flemish Brabant, told reporters that one train apparently did not heed a red signal as the second train - leaving 10 minutes late from the station at Buizingen - moved onto the track of the oncoming train.
Goovaerts told reporters that the surviving driver was on the train approaching the station.
Infrabel, the rail management company, said its technical teams would need three days to inspect six rail lines once the wreckage is removed, meaning train traffic was likely to remain disrupted in Brussels for the rest of the week.
Meanwhile, a wildcat strike by about half of Belgium's train drivers paralyzed much of the traffic in the southern part of the country and caused cancellations and delays in the north.
"It was an emotional reaction to the catastrophe of yesterday," Goovaerts said.
Many of the railway employees were outraged at accusations blaming one of the drivers for the accident before an investigation could be concluded, he said.
Infrabel called for the installation of automatic braking systems on all trains. Officials said these would have prevented the accident by immediately activating the brakes on the train that ran the red light at the entrance to the station.
"It was a nightmare," survivor Christian Wampach, 47, said at the crash site. "We were thrown about for about 15 seconds. There were a number of people injured in my car, but I think all the dead were in the first car."
Wampach was in the third car of a Brussels-bound train.
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