Passenger train derails in Egypt; some 100 injured

Cairo, April 18

A passenger train derailed Sunday north of Cairo, injuring around 100 people, Egyptian authorities said. It was the latest of several rail accidents to hit the country in recent years.

At least eight train wagons ran off the railway at the city of Banha in Qalyubia province, just north of Cairo, the provincial governor’s office said in a statement. Videos on social media purportedly showed wagons overturned and passengers escaping to safety along the railway.

The train was travelling to Nile Delta city of Mansoura from the Egyptian capital, the statement said. The health ministry said least 97 people were injured. It was not immediately clear what caused the train to derail.

Last week, at least 15 people were injured when train carriages derailed in the Nile Delta province of Sharqia.

Sunday’s train accident came three weeks after two passenger trains collided in the province of Sohag, killing at least 18 people and injuring 200 others, including children.

Prosecutors said they found that gross negligence by railway employees wahind the deadly March 25 crash, which caused public outcry across the country.

Train wrecks and mishaps are common in Egypt, where the railway system has a history of badly maintained equipment and mismanagement.

Hundreds of train accidents are reported every year. In February 2019 an unmanned locomotive slammed into a barrier inside Cairo’s main Ramses railway station, causing a huge explosion and a fire that killed at least 25 people. That crash prompted the then-transportation minister to resign.

Egypt’s deadliest train crash was in 2002, when over 300 people were killed after a fire broke out in an overnight train travelling from Cairo to southern Egypt. — AP

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