international
‘Why?’ asks Taiwan mourner, after 18 killed in train disaster
[su_label type=”info”]SMA News – Agencies [/su_label][su_spacer size=”10″] Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen offered words of consolation on Monday as she met relatives of 18 people killed and 187 injured when a train derailed in the island’s northeast, its worst rail disaster in more than three decades.
Officials said four carriages overturned on Sunday after all eight cars of a train carrying 366 passengers left the tracks on a bend near a railway station in Yilan county, about 40 km (25 miles) from Taipei, the island’s capital.
Tsai joined Buddhist monks in prayer before an altar adorned with flowers next to a hospital, while nearby, relatives and friends of the victims wept as they sifted through battered suitcases recovered from the train wreck.
“We are really sorry … you have to stay strong,” Tsai told Chen Yu-chan, 41, whose only daughter, a seventh grader, was killed. “We will do everything we can,” she told another person, who was sobbing bitterly during her visit to the hospital.
Health authorities appealed for blood donations to help treat the many injured people, who included one foreigner, an American. Six of the dead were under 18, officials said.
The disaster was Taiwan’s deadliest rail accident since a 1981 collision that killed 30 people, the official Central News Agency said.
The head of the state railway administration, Lu Jie-shen, had offered to resign but the transport minister did not accept the offer, the news agency reported. China’s policy-making Taiwan Affairs Office expressed “deep condolences” to the families of victims.
Train services resumed early on Monday, after all the derailed carriages had been moved to one side of the tracks. Authorities have set up an investigation committee and said they were trying to determine the cause of the accident, which remains unclear.
Many of the casualties happened in a carriage at the front of the train, said one official, adding that the driver, surnamed You, has been moved out of intensive care, though his condition was still unstable.
“We will ask him what happened after he stabilizes,” said Liu Can-huang, head of the car maintenance unit of the railways.
The train recorder, which tracks speed, among other data, had been sent to prosecutors to be examined, he added. The derailment was not expected to cause a major disruption to economic activity, however.
Officials said four carriages overturned on Sunday after all eight cars of a train carrying 366 passengers left the tracks on a bend near a railway station in Yilan county, about 40 km (25 miles) from Taipei, the island’s capital.
Tsai joined Buddhist monks in prayer before an altar adorned with flowers next to a hospital, while nearby, relatives and friends of the victims wept as they sifted through battered suitcases recovered from the train wreck.
“We are really sorry … you have to stay strong,” Tsai told Chen Yu-chan, 41, whose only daughter, a seventh grader, was killed. “We will do everything we can,” she told another person, who was sobbing bitterly during her visit to the hospital.
Health authorities appealed for blood donations to help treat the many injured people, who included one foreigner, an American. Six of the dead were under 18, officials said.
The disaster was Taiwan’s deadliest rail accident since a 1981 collision that killed 30 people, the official Central News Agency said.
The head of the state railway administration, Lu Jie-shen, had offered to resign but the transport minister did not accept the offer, the news agency reported. China’s policy-making Taiwan Affairs Office expressed “deep condolences” to the families of victims.
Train services resumed early on Monday, after all the derailed carriages had been moved to one side of the tracks. Authorities have set up an investigation committee and said they were trying to determine the cause of the accident, which remains unclear.
Many of the casualties happened in a carriage at the front of the train, said one official, adding that the driver, surnamed You, has been moved out of intensive care, though his condition was still unstable.
“We will ask him what happened after he stabilizes,” said Liu Can-huang, head of the car maintenance unit of the railways.
The train recorder, which tracks speed, among other data, had been sent to prosecutors to be examined, he added. The derailment was not expected to cause a major disruption to economic activity, however.
