NANCY, France — According to the Associated Press, a fire broke out in a sleeper car on overnight express train Wednesday, filling the car with smoke and killing 12 passengers, officials said. Five Americans were among the dead, the U.S. Embassy said.
At least eight others were injured, none seriously.
The train with 150 passengers was passing through the eastern French city of Nancy when the fire broke out three hours after departing from Paris on route to the southern Germany city of Munich, the French rail authority SNCF said.
The cause was an electrical short-circuit in the sleeping car where the blaze originated, according to regional French authorities, who earlier said the train was destined for Austria.
Most if not all victims — six men, five women and one child — died of smoke inhalation, authorities said. Their identities were not immediately known, although the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin said four of dead appeared to be German.
Richard Lankford, spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Paris, said that five Americans died in the fire, according to information received from French authorities. Hours earlier, Lankford had said no Americans were believed to be among the dead.
He declined to give the victims’ identities, pending notification of next of kin.
A train conductor first saw smoke at about 2:15 a.m. as the train passed the Nancy station. Flames shot up nearly 10 feet into the air. The conductor stopped the train about 800 yards past the station, and firefighters moved in.
“Rescuers got to the scene at 2:22 a.m. They discovered the first sleeping car charred,” Regional official Jean-Francois Cordet said. “Inside were 12 dead, nine injured.”
“The catastrophe was amplified by the fact that it was in a confined space,” chief firefighter Jean-Louis Modere said. “The fire was limited, and the amount of smoke very quickly became catastrophic.”
The injured — four Germans, three Britons, one American and one French national — were taken to a university hospital in Nancy, regional authorities said. SNCF said eight people were injured, none serious, and did not give a breakdown of nationalities. There was no explanation given for the discrepancy.
The charred train car, No. 261, belonged to Germany’s national railroad, Deutsche Bahn. The car was built in 1964 and underwent extensive renovation in 1999 and an overhaul in 2001, according Deutsche Bahn spokesman Dieter Huehnerkoch. Deutsche Bahn was sending experts and two board members to Nancy to take part in the investigation.
Police investigators were on the scene. A team of psychologists was sent in to help survivors cope with the trauma.
Officials offered passengers shelter in a local gymnasium, France Info radio reported.
French Transportation Minister Gilles de Robien and Louis Gallois, president of the French rail authority SNCF, were headed to the scene.
Fatal train accidents are extremely rare in France, whose high-speed rail network is considered one of the best in the world and a model for other countries.