At least 233 people were killed and 900 were injured when two passenger trains collided in India’s Odisha state, a government official said on Saturday; the country’s bloodiest rail accident in over a decade.
Pradeep Jena, the state’s chief secretary, said on Twitter that the death toll from Friday’s crash is expected to rise, Reuters reported.
“A high-level committee has been announced and will hold an inquiry into this incident. The Rail Safety Commissioner will also make an inquiry, and they will go and find the root cause of this accident – why did this happen – they will find out all the technical details,” Indian Railway Minister Ashwin Vaishnaw said on Saturday, visiting the incident site.
He continued by saying that in addition to the 80 doctors already on the site, over 200 ambulances and extra 100 doctors had been dispatched to the accident site in the Balasore district of Odisha.
Rescue efforts were underway as witnesses observed white body bags scattered along the crash site.
On Friday at around 7 p.m. local time, the Howrah Superfast Express, which travels from Bangalore to Howrah, West Bengal, collided with the Coromandel Express, which travels from Kolkata to Chennai.
