A locomotive crashed into a barrier at the Egyptian capital’s main train station on Wednesday, causing its fuel tank to explode and triggering a huge fire, killing at least 25 people, officials said.
Railway officials said the single railcar was traveling too fast when it collided head-on with the barrier. At least 47 people were also injured, many of them critically, and officials said the death toll could rise.
The explosion and fire blasted through people on the platform in the busy Ramses Station in downtown Cairo. A surveillance video showed the moment of impact when the car barreled past men and women walking by who are then engulfed in flames and smoke. Charred bodies lay on the platform, and a man in flames ran down a staircase in panic, according to other photos and videos posted on social media
The country´s transportation minister resigned hours after the accident.
A train engine appeared to have slammed into the buffers at the end ofthe track at high speed, sparking a major blaze that blackened the wallsof the Ramses station.
Firefighters were seen hosing down the charred wreckage of the traininside the station, as security forces guarded the site.
Twenty people were killed and 40 injured, the health ministry said.
Ahmed Ibrahim, a jewellery salesman, said he was on his way to workwhen he heard a loud explosion.
"I ran to see a lot of people injured. I had to carry a young girl with myown hands," he said, apparently still in shock.
"I saw bodies cut in half. I´d never seen that ... I never thought I´d evertouch dead bodies."
CCTV footage circulating online showed the train´s locomotive smashinginto the barrier without slowing down. People walking on the platformwere enveloped by smoke.
Separate footage filmed inside the station showed a fire engulfing thetrain and a nearby platform and people rushing to help the casualties.
Photos that emerged after the crash showed several scorched bodiesscattered around the train wreckage.
Several people were seen in videos running around and screaming forhelp after catching fire.
"I carried around 20 charred bodies to ambulances," said Atef AhmedMahmoud from the Nile Delta city of Zagazig.
Egyptians have long complained that the government has failed to dealwith chronic transport problems in the country, where roads are aspoorly maintained as railway lines.
Officials often blame the rail network´s poor maintenance on decades ofnegligence and a lack of funds.
Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouli who was quick to visit the site,promised a tough response.
"Any person found to be negligent will be held accountable and it will besevere," he said.
Hours later the cabinet announced that Madbouli had accepted theresignation of Transport Minister Hisham Arafat.
People at the site of the crash appeared to be frustrated at thegovernment´s failure to revamp the railway network.
The government has repeatedly promised to take steps to upgrade thesector especially after several derailments and collisions in recent years.
Egypt signed a deal worth one billion euros ($1.14 billion) with aRussian-Hungarian consortium to deliver passenger coaches to Egypt in2018.
The previous year it signed a $575 million deal with General Electric topurchase 100 locomotives.
Still, figures by the official statistics agency show there were 1,793 trainaccidents in 2017, up from 1,249 in 2016.
The deadliest accident on Egypt´s railways dates back to 2002 when 373people died when a fire ripped through a crowded train south of thecapital.
