GERMANY: German state prosecutor says human error was cause of magnetic train accident which killed 23

Record ID: 555906

  • Title: GERMANY: German state prosecutor says human error was cause of magnetic train accident which killed 23
  • Date: 24th September 2006
  • Summary: (W4) LATHEN, GERMANY (SEPTEMBER 23, 2006) (REUTERS) WIDE OF TRACK SEEN FROM THE STATION WITH TRANSRAPID TRAIN IN DISTANCE TRACK WITH TRAIN IN DISTANCE
  • Embargoed: 9th October 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Germany
  • Country: Germany
  • Topics: Disasters / Accidents / Natural catastrophes
  • Reuters ID: LVA7O2UHIU10A9HX715QM6I6JPB9
  • Story Text: German investigators were trying on Saturday (September 23) to discover why a high-speed magnetic levitation train crashed into a maintenance vehicle on its elevated track, killing 23 people and injuring 10.
    The high-tech Transrapid, one of the world's fastest trains, collided with a maintenance truck at high speed on Friday on a test track in the Emsland district of Germany.
    State prosecutor Alexander Retemeyer said that it had yet to be explained why the Transrapid started its run although the maintenance vehicle was still on the track.
    "Through the recordings we have been able to find out that the train driver used the emergency brake between 50 and 100 metres before the site of the accident, before the crash. That can certainly be clarified using the data," Retemeyer said.
    Retemeyer told journalists how the maintenance vehicle was under human control and that the accident was due to human error. He explained how the Transrapid has a train safety system, where the Transrapid's driver asks to enter a certain section of track and that section is then 'unlocked'.
    This system prevents the train from travelling into sections of track it is not supposed to travel in, and is automatically stopped should it enter a part of track that it has not been permitted to enter. However the maintenance vehicle, which had a driver, was not part of this train safety system.
    The spokesman for Emsland police, Achim van Remmerten, told journalists that the 23 dead have all been identified without doubt. Among the passengers were "a visiting group from (utility company) RWE from Grafschaft (in northwestern Germany) and Emsland, and a second group from Emsland and also some employees and relatives and two Americans."
    As workers began to dismantle parts of the train and bring them down from the track, mourners wearing black gathered near the Transrapid visitor centre for a memorial service.
    Wreaths and candles had also been left under the tracks at the site of the crash.
    A delegation led by commander Wu Xiangming, manager of the Transrapid line in Shanghai, visited the site, said Rudolf Schwarz, managing director of IABG, the test track's operator.
    He said Wu wanted to consider the implications of the crash for the Transrapid train line in Shanghai, which was launched in 2003 using German technology and is the world's only commercial magnetic levitation train in operation.
    The Chinese government and Transrapid International, the train's developer, have been discussing the possibility of extending the Chinese line by 160 km (100 miles) to the city of Hangzhou.
    Transport Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee also visited the crash site to check on the investigation.
    Uwe Schuenemann, interior minister of the state of Lower Saxony, said none of the 10 injured was still in critical condition.
    The train, which rides on a track supported by concrete stilts around five metres above ground, was not derailed in the accident, officials said, but its height above ground had made the rescue operation difficult.
    The costly Maglev train, which set a speed record of 450 km per hour (280 miles per hour) in 1993, was developed by Transrapid International, a joint venture between German industrial firms Siemens AG and ThyssenKrupp.
    In Shanghai, travellers continued to ride the Maglev train on Saturday, hundreds commuting between Shanghai and its international airport every hour. The Maglev reached its usual top speed of about 430 kph during the 30 km trip.
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