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Updated 11am
TEN PEOPLE HAVE died and scores were taken to hospital after a train derailed in Moscow’s packed metro during rush hour today, city authorities said.
The accident is believed to be the most serious in the eight-decade history of the city’s metro system, the world’s busiest.
Russian national television described scenes of chaos on the packed underground system, saying passengers fell like dominoes when the train braked abruptly.
“Right now 10 people (are dead),” the city’s deputy mayor Pyotr Biryukov told journalists at the scene as the rescue operation continued, with about five people still believed to be trapped underground.
Georgy Golukhov, the head of Moscow’s health department, had earlier said five people had perished and another 106 had been taken to hospital.
AFP correspondents saw several helicopters and dozens of ambulances at the scene outside Park Pobedy metro station in western Moscow.
“I thought it was the end,” one passenger told state television channel Rossiya 24. “We were trapped and only got out through a miracle.
“There were lots of injured,” he added. “Various injuries: heads, legs.”
’Moaning with pain’
Alexei Naryshkin, a presenter on the popular Echo of Moscow radio station, posted a photograph on Twitter of rescue workers carrying a body in a black bag.
“They are laying out the injured. They constantly go down with stretchers. They carry them out. Some are unconscious. Some are moaning with pain,” Naryshkin wrote.
Another witness, a young man in a polo shirt, told Life News television: “I got into the carriage and after about 20 seconds, the light went out and the train was just pulled apart. I was just thrown into the centre of the carriage.”
“Panic started,” he told Life News television.
“We climbed out of the carriages and we saw a blockage, men took hammers and pliers and broke it down and we walked on. The train was smashed, the chassis was just pulled apart.”
Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin was at the scene and pledged to do everything possible to help the victims.
Golukhov said about 60 ambulances were stationed at the scene, while one seriously injured passenger was evacuated by helicopter.
Television footage showed rescue workers carrying the injured away on stretchers, while paramedics treated some on nearby grass verges.
A spokesman for the emergencies ministry said in televised remarks that the accident happened when a train braked suddenly after a false alarm.
“This is the most serious man-made disaster in the Moscow underground in its entire history,” infrastructure analyst Alexei Khazbiyev told AFP.
“It is the most serious accident apart from terrorist attacks.”
Opened under Stalin in 1935, Moscow’s ornate metro is considered the world’s busiest and carries some nine million people every day.
- © AFP 2014.
First published 8.15am
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What about introducing financial penalties along with increased sentences. Criminals paying substantial damages to victims of crime, even if that means seizing their assets or making them, in extreme cases, homeless. Holding parents responsible for their Under 16′s in order to minimise social crime. Violent rioters and social media outlets paying for burning buildings and garda cars etc instead of giving the taxpayer the bill. Hit them where it hurts most, just like they do to ‘victims’.
@BarryH: Not sure how the legal system works in that respect but wouldn’t that be a separate, civil case besides the criminal one to award a monetary fine?
@Athena: Most of the laws we have in place are leftovers from Brit rule. Irish ?legislators? couldn’t be bothered on updating them to suit modern society and then we have, as far as I can see, data protection rules, that seem to favour the people ie right / left wing criminals and social media sites, that aim to disrupt society instead of protecting society. If the legislators were doing their job they would make ‘exceptions’ to the laws.
E.G. The Gardai told Instagram to take down the online threats made to Simon Harris and give them the name of the culprit. Instagram replied that that would be in breach of the culprits rights. He is Taoiseach and can ‘ legislate’ Does Simon not think that the common man should be protected more than the criminal?????????
I want to feel sympathy for politicians who are abused but it is in their hands and their fault. They could save the taxpayer millions in libel cases.
About time, a huge step forward!!!!
For heinous cases involving fatalities of course the presiding Judge, having heard all the evidence, should be able to nominate/ sentence with a ‘minimal’ tariff
Life should mean life.
All well and good going forward,Helen nicely done. Maybe find somewhere to put criminals that get tru the revolving door!!!
And judges should be elected.
@AnthonyK: they are. We’ve devolved that role to our elected representatives. Or do you mean like the US system which has proven to more about politics then the rule of law?
@Paul C: Nolan??
There should be minimum sentecens for a lot more crimes. Now its a toss if you have judge Nolan for a suspended sentence or another one for a much harder punishment.
@hans vos: Just go online prior to your trial… he’ll prob give you a high five. A disgrace of an individual.
“minimum”—- not——’minumal’
@Buster Lawless: you’ll need to tell that to the likes of Judges Nolan and O’Donnell not us.
Ain’t much good if the likes of Martin Nolan won’t even lock them up on normal sentences!!
@Michael o connor: Don’t get me started… an absolute disgrace that he’s still on the Bar.
‘Life incommunicado’ in a communications age. I.e., never again permitted to use a phone, computer or any communication device. In this day and age, that would hurt. And take their shoes too. And toss their hair while you’re at it.
@Paul C: Judges should go before the electorate and show what they did to uphold the law and make the society better.
There’s no need for this, sure isn’t Dublin a safe city!
We need to build more prisons so criminals can be given proper sentences. Criminals with 50-100 previous conviction should not be walking the streets for a very long time. Also SA sentences in this country are an absolute joke. 8 years for rape is a ridiculous. I don’t blame some women for not reporting these crimes. Also we need far more consecutive sentences.
have your say