Train derails in south
Train on way to Beer Sheva crashes into truck between Lod and Kiryat Gat; seven commuters killed and 200 injured
REVADIM -- At least sevencommuters were killed (see video) and 200 were injured when a train hit a truck near Kibbutz Revadim in the south of the country Tuesday afternoon . Of the 74 passengers taken to the hospital, 10 are listed as either in serious or critical condition.
See video courtesy of Channel 10:
Rescue teams from the IDF Home Front Command are trying to free passengers still trapped in the wreckage.
The Beer Sheva-bound train jumped off the rail after striking a truck, which was attempting to cross the tracks from a dirt path. No one heard the train blare its horn before smacking into the vehicle.
Witnesses said that the truck driver was among the dead and that his vehicle was completely destroyed -- as was the train's engine. The first three passenger cars were badly damaged.
A witness said that, because of problems with the air conditioning in the rear of the train, passengers had crowded into the first few cars.
A spokesman for Magen David Adom said, "The scene of the accident is difficult to reach because there are only dirt roads in the area. We are using another train to evacuate the injured."
"It was a horror, pure horror. The train was completely wrecked and looked like a pile of railings … When they lift the overturned cars, I'm afraid of what they'll find underneath," Moshe Gamrov, a ZAKA rescue worker at the scene, said.
On the train
Ynet reporter Shlomi Donner was on board when the train struck the train at 5:45 PM.
One passenger told Ynet, "All the passengers flew from their seats and the cars shook badly."
The witness reported that the commuters were hysterical.
Soldiers on board used their personal medical kits to treat the injured. Shorty afterward, dozens of ambulances arrived on the scene, and five IAF helicopters evacuated some of the injured to Kaplan Hospital in Rehovot and other medical centers in the area.
Iliya, 19, told Ynet, "We were riding when all of a sudden the engine, the train, hit something. We got everyone outside. There was a powerful bang, and everything was damaged. I saw around me people who were injured."
Dina Dahan, from Beer Sheva, recalled the aftermath of the crash: "There was a lot of dust and we saw people who could not be extricated from their seats. Firefighters rescued the badly injured."
Officers and two rescue crews from the Home Front Command's southern district also provided aid.
The fallout
An Israel Railways spokesman said that the line between Kibbutz Naan and Kiyat Gat is out of commission.
Transportation Minister Meir Shitreet (Likud) told Ynet: "I intend to set up a committee, including Israel Railway and Transportation Ministry personnel, to investigate what had happened and to present me with their report in the next few days."
Some five years ago, a Beer Sheva-bound train hit a truck in the Revadim area, injuring 21, and two years ago, 40-year-old train operator Shabtai Balila was killed in yet another collision.
Hospital emergency phone numbers (from Israel):
- Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer - 1255131
- Hadassah Ein Karem - 1255122
- Soroka - 1255177
- Barzilai - 1255171
- Kaplan - 1255181
-- Eli Senyor, Hanan Greenberg, Diana Bahur-Nir, Doron Sheffer and Shmulik Hadad contributed to this article
