Tuesday April 26, 2005

At least 69 dead, 440 hurt in Japan train crash

AMAGASAKI, Japan (AP) - The death toll in a train derailment in western Japan rose to 69 early Tuesday, nearly a day after a packed commuter train jumped the tracks and hurtled into an apartment complex in the deadliest Japanese rail accident in four decades.

More than 440 were injured.

Investigators focused on whether excessive speed or the actions of the inexperienced, 23-year-old driver caused the crash in an urban area near Amagasaki, about 410 kilometers (250 miles) west of Tokyo.

The packed seven-car train was carrying 580 passengers when it derailed near Amagasaki, plowing through an automobile in its path before slamming into a nine-story apartment complex.

Two of the five derailed cars were shoved inside and flattened against the wall of the building's first-floor garage.

Hundreds of rescue workers and police swarmed the wreckage to recover bodies, tend to the injured and try to free at least one more survivor still trapped inside nearly a day after the crash.

Relatives of the victims were struggling to comprehend their loss.

"I only saw him the night before,'' Hiroko Kuki, whose son Tetsuji died in the crash, told NHK.

"I wish he were alive somewhere... I wish it were only a nightmare.''

Monday's accident occurred at a curve after a straightaway. Passengers speculated that the driver - who was still unaccounted for - may have been speeding to make up for lost time after overshooting the previous station.

Investigators suspected speed and driver inexperience but weren't ruling out other explanations.

They were investigating the case as a possible professional negligence on the train operator, West Japan Rail, Co., a prefectural police spokesman said on condition of anonymity.

Transport Minister Kazuo Kitagawa told reporters he would order all of Japan's railway operators to conduct safety inspections in the coming days.

"It's tragic,'' Kitagawa said at the scene.

"We have to investigate why this horrible accident happened.''

The accident was the worst rail disaster in nearly 42 years in safety-conscious Japan, which is home to one of the world's most complex, efficient and heavily traveled rail networks.

A three-train crash in November 1963 killed 161 people in Tsurumi, outside Tokyo. The train operator's president, Takeshi Kakiuchi, apologized for the accident.

Tsunemi Murakami, the company's safety director, said it wasn't clear how fast the train was traveling.

A crew member aboard told police later he "felt the train was going faster than usual,'' public broadcaster NHK said, echoing comments from passengers who told the network that the driver seemed to be trying to make up for lost time after overshooting the previous station by 8 meters (25 feet) and then having to back up.

The train was nearly two minutes behind schedule, company officials said.

The driver - identified as 23-year-old Ryujiro Takami - had obtained his train operator's license in May 2004.

One month later, he overran a station and was issued a warning for his mistake, railway officials and police said.

Monday's crash occurred at a curve, where drivers are required to slow to a speed of 70 kph (43 mph).

An automatic braking system along that stretch of track is among the oldest in Japan and can't halt trains traveling at high speeds, transport ministry officials said.

Newer systems are designed to stop trains at signs of trouble without requiring drivers to take emergency action.

Murakami, the JR West official, estimated that the train had to have been traveling at 133 kilometers per hour (82 miles per hour) to have jumped the track purely because of excessive speed.

Investigators also found evidence of rocks on the tracks, but hadn't determined whether that contributed to the crash, he said.

Experts suspected a confluence of factors was to blame.

"There are very few train accidents in Japan in which a train has flipped just because it was going too fast. There might have been several conditions at work - speed, winds, poor train maintenance or aging rails,'' Kazuhiko Nagase, a Kanazawa Institute of Technology professor and train expert, told NHK.

"For the train to flip, it had to be traveling at an extremely high speed,'' Nagase added.

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi offered condolences to families of passengers who were killed, as did Emperor Akihito, in rare unscripted remarks at a news conference before an overseas goodwill trip.

Survivors said the force of the derailment sent passengers tumbling, and many were bloodied or unconscious.

A few noted the stench of burning metal.

"There was a violent shaking, and the next moment I was thrown to the floor ... and I landed on top of a pile of other people,'' passenger Tatsuya Akashi told NHK.

"I didn't know what happened, and there were many people bleeding.''

Distraught relatives rushed to hospitals to search lists of the injured and dead.

Takamichi Hayashi said his elder brother, 19-year-old Hiroki, had called their mother twice on a mobile phone from inside one of the train cars hours after the crash but remained unaccounted for.

He said he had heard Hiroki was among those still inside the wreckage.

Deadly train accidents are rare in Japan.

Five people were killed and 33 were injured in March 2000, when a Tokyo subway hit a derailed train.

An accident killed 42 people in April 1991 in Shigaraki, western Japan.

An earthquake in 2004 caused a bullet train to derail - the first since the high speed trains went into service 40 years ago. - AP

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