India train derailment kills more than 100 people

More than 100 people have been killed and at least 200 injured after a train derailed near the city of Kanpur in northern.

Hundreds of people were trapped after 14 carriages of the express train, travelling from Indore to Patna, crumpled into one another as they came off the tracks on Sunday. The train derailed near the village of Purwa, about 40 miles (65km) from Kanpur.

The crash occurred at about 3am when the majority of passengers were asleep. Most of the victims were in two carriages near the engine that overturned. Ruby Gupta, who was travelling to the city of Azamgarh for her wedding, searched the wreckage for her father. “I cannot find my father and I have been looking everywhere for him,” she told an NDTV reporter. “Some people told me to look in hospitals and in morgues, but I am clueless as to what to do.”

Gupta lost her wedding clothes, jewellery and belongings in the derailment, but her biggest worry was finding her father, who was going to give her away at the wedding in two weeks’ time. “I do not know if my marriage will go as planned or not,” she said. “I want to find my father now. I have tried calling everywhere, but I do not know what to do.”

Nearby, a young boy who had also been on the train waited near the scene, hoping his father would be found alive by rescue workers. “The whole train was shaking,” he said. “My sisters and brothers were there. I found them all, I just can’t find my father.”

One eyewitness said: “At about 3am, the train started shaking. Then I don’t know what happened, the carriage overturned. We were in coach five. We were trying to open the door of the coach, but it wouldn’t budge. Somehow we managed to get out. The goddess Kali has saved us, or else none of us would have survived.” While some looked for missing relatives or luggage, others waited in surrounding fields as rescue workers searched the site for bodies.

A final list of casualties is yet to be released, but police reports suggest the death toll has exceeded 100. More than 200 injured people have been given emergency medical help at the scene or taken to nearby hospitals.

Television footage showed the carriages lying overturned near the tracks as anxious crowds looked on, some with bandaged limbs. 

Emergency services and ambulances took longer than usual to reach the site because the incident took place while the train was passing through a rural region.

Medical trains from the nearby city of Jhansi were dispatched in the relief effort and cranes were deployed to lift the crushed trains apart. National Disaster Response Force and army units used gas cutters to try to find survivors mid-morning on Sunday, as hopes of finding people alive dwindled.