- Signal failures likely cause India’s worst disaster in decades.
- More bodies were moved to the school, which is being used as a makeshift morgue.
- The death toll is expected to rise further.
BAHINGA: Rescuers and families searched through mangled train carriages on Sunday for more victims of India’s worst rail accident in more than two decades, which may have been caused by a signal failure.
At least 288 people were killed on Friday when a passenger train derailed and collided with another near Balasore district in the eastern state of Odisha.
Five more bodies were brought to a school used as a mortuary near the crash site in the early hours of Sunday.
“We don’t know how many more bodies will come,” said a health worker.
Indian Railways says it transports more than 13 million people every day. But the state-owned monopoly has a poor safety record due to aging infrastructure.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who faces elections next year, visited the site on Saturday to speak with rescue workers, inspect the wreckage and meet some of the nearly 1,200 injured.
South Eastern Railway has said that the preliminary report indicated that the accident was a result of signal failure.
The accident occurred when one of the trains derailed from the main track onto a side track and collided with a stationary goods train, causing it to derail and collide with a third train that came later. .
The passenger trains were running at a speed of 130 km/h (81 mph), the official said.
Workers with heavy machinery were clearing damaged tracks, damaged trains and power lines, as distraught relatives looked on.
“We were called by the police and asked to come,” said Bisakhi Dhar, from West Bengal state, looking for her husband Nikhil Dhar.
She said her husband’s luggage and mobile have been found but there is no information about his whereabouts.
The Ministry of Railways said on Twitter that more than 1,000 people are involved in the rescue.
“The target is to complete the entire rehabilitation work and work on the tracks by Wednesday morning,” Railway Minister Ashwini Vishnu said.
At a business center where bodies are taken for identification, dozens of relatives waited, many in tears holding identification cards and photos of missing loved ones.
Kanchan Chaudhary, 49, was looking for her husband in the centre. Five people from his village were traveling in the train, four of whom are being treated in hospital for their injuries. However, Kanchan Chaudhary said that her husband was found dead. Reuters As she cried while waiting to claim compensation at a counter at the center, she and her husband’s identity cards were with her.
Relatives of the dead will receive 1 million Indian rupees ($12,000) in compensation, while those seriously injured will receive 200,000 INR, with 50,000 rupees for minor injuries, Vishnu said on Saturday.
Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, US President Joe Biden, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, British Prime Minister Rishi Singh and French President Emmanuel Macron have expressed their condolences to those who died in the horrific train accident.