Egypt Train Crash Video Shows Wreckage From Catastrophic Collision

A train collision in Egypt has killed at least 32 people and injured at least 66 more, the country's health ministry said.

The trains were moving through the province of Solag, some 286 miles south of Cairo. The country's railway authority said emergency brakes in the first train were triggered by "unknown individuals," causing the train to halt sharply. A second train then crashed into the first from behind, causing two carriages to keel off the tracks.

Health authorities sent 36 ambulances to the scene and casualties were being taken to local hospitals, the ministry said in a statement. At least 66 people were injured in the crash. The public prosecutor's office said it had ordered an investigation.

A video on social media shows the train wreckage and people crowded around it, with parts of the train completely upended and people climbing on the roof of the railcars.

"The trains collided while going at not very high speeds, which led to the destruction of two carriages and a third to overturn," a security source told Reuters news agency. The Egyptian ministers of transport and health are heading to the scene to inspect rescue efforts, local media reported.

Railway renewal

Rail crashes are common in the north African nation, which has one of the largest and oldest rail networks. According to the most recent official data, 1,793 train accidents took place across Egypt in 2017.

A passenger train derailed near the southern city of Aswan in 2018, which injured at least six people, leading to the authorities firing the chief of Egypt's railway network.

A year earlier, 43 people died and 179 were injured after a train traveling from Cairo hit a train waiting at a small station in the district of Khorshid in Alexandria.

That same year, President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi said the government needed another $14.1 billion to overhaul the country's old railway network. The president spoke a day after a passenger train crashed into a cargo train, killing at least 12 people, including a child.

At least 51 people were killed when two commuter trains collided near Cairo in 2016.

The country's deadliest train crash took place in 2002, when more than 300 people were killed after fire erupted on a train travelling from Cairo to southern Egypt.

On 8 March, the World Bank approved $440 million to support Egypt's run-down rail network. The total cost of the Railway Improvement and Safety for Egypt (RISE) project stands at $681.1 million. $241.1 million of that sum will be contributed by the Egyptian National Railways (ENR).