Tracks fault led to Buxar accident: Early probe

The derailment of the North East Express in Bihar's Buxar district on Wednesday night, which killed four people and left 30 injured, may have been caused by a rail fracture, two officials aware of the investigation said on Thursday.

- Neha LM Tripathi

There were frantic rescue operations through the night, first led by local residents who pulled people out of the damaged bogies, and then by the Railways and the district administration that said that all those trapped have now been evacuated, and work is in progress to situate the bogies back on the track and resume operations.

Overall, the accident led to 95 trains being diverted, 31 cancelled and two rescheduled.

The accident comes months after errors in the automated signalling system led to the Coromandel Express colliding into a stationary goods train, with some of its bogies then crashing into the onrushing Yeshwantpur-Howrah Express in Odisha's Bahanaga Bazaar, leaving 296 dead and over a 1,000 people injured in what was India's worst rail disaster for two decades. The accident on Wednesday night, preliminary investigations suggested, was caused by a rail fracture.