NEW DELHI: India’s railway ministry said Sunday a “ghastly” accident was narrowly avoided after 22 train coaches carrying some 1,000 passengers became detached from the engine and sped backwards for miles before being stopped.
The runaway carriages in the eastern state of Odisha rolled for 12 kilometers (seven miles) before being brought to a shuddering halt by rocks placed on the tracks by railway staff.
A spokesman for the railway ministry’s eastern division said none of about 1,000 passengers were injured in the incident Saturday night.
But seven railway employees who did not follow proper procedures have been suspended and an investigation launched into how the carriages became separated during the journey from the western state of Gujarat to Odisha, said spokesman JP Mishra.
Authorities believe that brakes applied when carriages are detached or attached to the engine were either incorrectly used or overlooked altogether.
“Something ghastly could have happened and it was averted by alert staff. Safety cannot be compromised,” Mishra told AFP, adding “more heads are likely to roll.”
“Everybody in the railways (ministry) is aghast and shocked.”
Mobile footage posted on social media showed the carriages speeding past a railway platform as helpless onlookers screamed and yelled at passengers to pull the train’s emergency brake.
More than 22 million passengers commute daily on some 9,000 trains across India.
The incident is just latest to beset the creaking rail network, which dates back to the colonial era.
Last November 13 coaches of an express train derailed in northern India, killing three and leaving nine injured.
A year before that, 146 people died in a similar disaster.
A 2012 government report said almost 15,000 people were killed in various ways every year on India’s railways and described the loss of life as an annual “massacre.”
Runaway train rolls for miles in India without engine
Runaway train rolls for miles in India without engine
- Runaway carriages rolled for 12 kilometers
- None of the train's 1,000 passengers were injured
Gunmen from Nigeria kill five Cameroonian soldiers, MP says
YAOUNDE: Gunmen from Nigeria have killed at least five Cameroonian soldiers and wounded several others in the village of Bakinjaw on Cameroon’s border with Nigeria, a member of parliament for the district and a traditional leader said on Saturday.
It is the latest in a series of attempts to seize territory in the area.
Aka Martin Tyoga, MP for the district of Akwaya in southwestern Cameroon, where the incident took place, told Reuters the attack happened early on Friday, when hundreds of armed Fulani herdsmen crossed the border from Taraba state in Nigeria to attack a military post.
He said it was a retaliation after Cameroonian soldiers killed several herdsmen the day before.
Agwa Linus, traditional ruler of Bakinjaw, said the attackers also burnt down his home.
“This is not the first time they are attacking — it’s very unfortunate,” he said.
Jimmy Carter’s long public goodbye begins
PLAINS, Georgia: Jimmy Carter’s long public goodbye began on Saturday in Georgia, with the 39th US president’s flag-draped casket rolling through his tiny hometown and past his boyhood farmhouse on its way to Atlanta, where he climbed the political ladder and based his decades of humanitarian work after leaving the White House.
The former president’s six-day state funeral started in Americus at the Phoebe Sumter Medical Center, where current and former Secret Service agents who protected the late president loaded his remains into a black hearse and walked alongside as it rolled off the campus toward Plains.
With Carter’s children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren accompanying their patriarch, a mournful train whistle filled the clear air as the pallbearers faced the hearse, hands on their hearts, for a final goodbye.
In Plains, where Carter was born Oct. 1, 1924, and lived most of his life, mourners lined the main street, some holding bouquets of flowers and wearing pins bearing images of the former president. He died on Dec. 29 at the age of 100.
“We want to pay our respects,” said 12-year-old Will Porter Shelbrock, who was born more than three decades after Carter left the White House in 1981. “He was ahead of his time on what he tried to do and tried to accomplish.”
It was Porter Shelbrock’s idea to make the trip to Plains from Gainesville, Florida, with his grandmother, Susan Cone, 66. He admires Carter for his humanitarian work building houses and waging peace, and talking about a warming planet before the climate crisis was part of routine political discourse.
Willie Browner, 75, described Carter as hailing from a bygone era of American politics. “This man, he thought of more than just himself,” said Browner, who grew up in the town of Parrott, about 15 miles from Plains, before moving to Miami. Browner said it meant “a great deal” to have a president come from a small southern town like his — something he worries isn’t likely to happen again.
German leader is more worried about Musk’s backing of a far-right party than his insults
- Tech billionaire Elon Musk has endorsed the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party ahead of German elections
- Scholz described Musk as a rich media entrepreneur who did not "appreciate social democratic politics"
BERLIN: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz says he’s staying “cool” against critical personal comments made by Elon Musk but finds it worrying that the US billionaire makes the effort to get involved in a general election by endorsing the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
Scholz was reacting after Musk, a close ally to US President-elect Donald Trump, called the chancellor a “fool” after his coalition government collapsed in November and later backed the AfD in an opinion piece he wrote for a major newspaper in Germany.
Scholz, head of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), said in comments published Saturday by the German magazine Stern that there is “nothing new” in criticism by “rich media entrepreneurs who do not appreciate social democratic politics and do not hold back with their opinions.”
“You have to stay cool,” Scholz told Stern.
“I find it much more worrying than such insults that Musk is supporting a party like the AfD, which is in parts right-wing extremist, which preaches rapprochement with Putin’s Russia and wants to weaken transatlantic relations,” Scholz said.
The AfD is monitored by Germany’s domestic intelligence service on suspicion of being right-wing extremist and has already been recognized as such in some individual German states.
Germany will hold an early parliamentary electionon Feb. 23 after Scholz’s thee-party coalition collapsed in November in a dispute over how to revitalize the country’s stagnant economy.
The vice chancellor and economy minister, Robert Habeck, also warned Musk against getting involved in Germany’s politics.
“Hands off our democracy, Mr. Musk!” Habeck said in an interview with the Spiegel magazine.
“The combination of enormous wealth, control over information and networks, the use of artificial intelligence and the willingness to ignore rules is a frontal attack on our democracy,” said Habeck, the Green Party’s candidate for chancellor.
Musk recently caused uproar after backing the AfD in an opinion piece for the Welt am Sonntag, leading to the resignation of the paper’s opinion editor, Eva Marie Kogel, in protest.
“The Alternative for Germany (AfD) is the last spark of hope for this country,” Musk wrote in his translated commentary.
The Tesla Motors CEO also wrote that his investment in Germany gave him the right to comment on the country’s condition.
The AfD is polling strongly, but its candidate for the top job, Alice Weidel, has no realistic chance of becoming chancellor because other parties refuse to work with the far-right party.
Prince William expresses sadness at death of his former nanny’s stepson in New Orleans attack
- Edward Pettifer was the stepson of Tiggy Legge-Bourke, who was the nanny for both William and his brother, Prince Harry
- King Charles III is said to be deeply saddened by the news
LONDON: Prince William expressed his shock and sadness Saturday at the news of the death of his former nanny’s stepson in the New Year’s truck attack in New Orleans that killed 14 people.
London’s Metropolitan Police confirmed Saturday that they are supporting the family of 31-year-old Edward Pettifer, including helping them through the process of returning his body to the UK. Pettifer, who is from west London, is the final victim to be identified.
In a statement on social media, the Prince of Wales said he and his wife, Catherine, were “shocked and saddened by the tragic death of Ed Pettifer. Our thoughts and prayers remain with the Pettifer family and all those innocent people who have been tragically impacted by this horrific attack.”
Pettifer was the stepson of Tiggy Legge-Bourke, who was the nanny for both William and his brother, Prince Harry, between 1993 and 1999, which included time after the death of their mother Princess Diana in 1997. Legge-Bourke, who is also known as Alexandra Pettifer, was regularly photographed with Diana.
British media also reported that King Charles III is said to be deeply saddened by the news and that he has sent his condolences to Pettifer’s family.
In a statement, Pettifer’s family said they were “devastated at the tragic news of Ed‘s death” and described him as “a wonderful son, brother, grandson, nephew and a friend to so many.”
“We will all miss him terribly. Our thoughts are with the other families who have lost their family members due to this terrible attack,” the family added.
The UK’s Foreign Office also said it was supporting Pettifer’s family and was in contact with US authorities.
Authorities say 14 people were killed and about 30 were injured in the attack early Wednesday by Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a former Army soldier who posted several videos on his Facebook hours before the attack previewing the violence he would unleash and proclaiming his support for the Islamic State militant group. The coroner’s office listed the cause of death for all 14 victims as “blunt force injuries.”
Jabbar, 42, was fatally shot in a firefight with police at the scene of the deadly crash on Bourbon Street, famous worldwide for its festive vibes in New Orleans’ historic French Quarter.
Malaysia expels two boats ferrying about 300 Myanmar migrants
KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia said Saturday it expelled two boats ferrying about 300 undocumented migrants from Myanmar from the country’s waters.
The Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) said the boats were located two nautical miles (3.7 kilometers) southwest of the northern resort of Langkawi late Friday evening.
“MMEA provided assistance, including food and clean drinking water, before expelling the boats out to the national maritime border to continue their journey,” Director-General Mohd Rosli Abdullah said in a statement.
“We are also working closely with Thai authorities to obtain additional information on the movements of these boats.”
On Friday Malaysian police detained almost 200 suspected Rohingya migrants from Myanmar after their boat ran aground in Langkawi.
The Rohingya experience persecution in their predominantly Buddhist homeland of Myanmar, with many fleeing to affluent, Muslim-majority Malaysia or refugee camps in Bangladesh.
They often endure harrowing, months-long sea journeys to arrive in Malaysia by boat or sneak into the country via its porous border with Thailand.
If caught, they are often sent to detention centers that rights groups say are typically overcrowded and filthy.
