(The following Reuters article was posted on the New York Times’ website on May 14.)
ROME — Two packed intercity trains collided near a Rome station on Wednesday, injuring some 20 passengers as carriages were knocked onto their sides and a locomotive rammed into a sleeper car, officials said.
Passengers said it was a “miracle” there were no deaths during the rush hour collision, considering there were almost 1,000 people aboard the two trains.
“All of a sudden we felt a strong jolt,” Giuseppe Mancuzo, who was aboard one of the trains, told Reuters.
“I got out of the train as fast as I could, but I saw at the other end people were still trapped. It was a miracle we were able to go and pull them out alive.”
The trains slammed into each other near the Tiburtina station in the northeast of the Italian capital at around 8:30 a.m. (2:30 a.m. EDT).
Six carriages and a locomotive were derailed by the impact and toppled over. A sleeper car was wrecked when a locomotive slammed into it, shattering windows and sending blankets and mattresses flying.
One person broke a leg and others, including a pregnant woman, were treated for shock and slight injuries. The trains knocked over power lines and split the metal tracks.
“The problem happened because one of the trains failed to respect a stop signal,” government official Emilio del Mese said at the scene of the crash.
One of the trains was heading through the Italian capital on its way to Naples from Munich, Germany, while the other was traveling north from Sicily.
Italy’s rail network has suffered a number of minor accidents in recent years and transport officials have called for massive investment to modernize the aging system.
Last July eight people died when an express train derailed in Sicily because of maintenance failure.