- Title: POLAND: Country mourns train crash victims
- Date: 6th March 2012
- Summary: WARSAW, POLAND (MARCH 5, 2012) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF FLAG FLYING AT HALF MAST OVER PRESIDENTIAL PALACE VARIOUS OF MAN READING NEWSPAPER IN STREET WOMAN BUYING NEWSPAPER
- Embargoed: 21st March 2012 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Poland, Poland
- Country: Poland
- Topics: Accidents,Transport
- Reuters ID: LVACSJK5YHPQ560LP9JFE2OBT4RJ
- Story Text: Poland began a two-day national mourning period on Monday (March 5) for the 16 people killed in a head-on collision in the country's worst rail accident in more than two decades.
Two trains collided at an average speed of 100 km (60 miles) near the town of Szczekociny in southern Poland on Saturday (March 3) night after one of them switched to the wrong track minutes before the crash.
"Although I don't often travel by train, from what I hear and what I see it's in a terrible state. There's a lot of cutbacks. Instead of more trains services running and more train lines there are less. I don't know, but what has happened is a tragedy, it's difficult for me to talk about it. Thank you," said Warsaw resident Radoslaw Zakowski.
"It really pains me to think about this tragedy, both tragedies especially the most recent one, but I don't think those people that come here for the Euros will be afraid to travel by train, no, I don't think so. Accidents happen everywhere. God knows what caused this - was it human error, technical failure, mechanical or what?" said Joanna Przybylska.
"I travel by train almost every week and I could have been on that train as well. In my opinion situations like this should not be happening. It's a big tragedy," said student JOanna Przbylanska.
Newspaper headlines described the horror of the passengers of the trains trapped in the bent and crushed carriages after the crash.
Rescuers recovered 16 bodies from the wreckage and were able to identify nine of the victims. Nearly 60 of the estimated 350 passengers on board were injured, three remained in intensive care on Sunday (March 4).
More than 450 fire-fighters and other rescue workers struggled overnight to remove victims from the wreckage at a remote field crossed only by a pair of rail tracks. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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