The worst railway accidents of the last 25 years in Europe. In Portugal, the worst happened in 1985.
At least 36 people were killed in a train collision in Greece on Wednesday. Human error was cited by Greek authorities as the cause of the accident. These are some of the worst train accidents in Europe, including Portugal.
A train collision killed at least 36 people in Greece on Wednesday. Human error was cited by Greek authorities as the cause of the accident. These are some of the worst train accidents in Europe, including Portugal.
On June 3, 1998, a train derailed in Germany, killing 101 people and injuring 88 in the northern region of Eschede. The country had not experienced a disaster with such a high death toll since June 1945, when an accident in Munich claimed 102 lives.
In July 2013, a high-speed train derailed on a curve and crashed into a wall near the Santiago de Compostela station in Spain.
The train was traveling at 197 mph at a point on the line where the speed limit is 80 mph.
The tragedy, considered the worst accident in Spain since 1944, left 80 dead and 140 injured.
In January 2006, another derailment killed 47 passengers in Montenegro.
At least 234 people were injured in an overcrowded convoy traveling to Podgorica, the country’s capital.
In Marganets, Ukraine, 45 people died when a train collided with a bus in October 2010.
At the time, authorities blamed the bus driver, who died in the crash, for entering the crossing without heeding the red light and the warning cries of passengers.
Turkey’s worst train accident happened in Pamukova in July 2004, when a train derailed due to speeding, killing 41 people and injuring about 80.
In Hungary, another accident between a train and a bus killed 33 people in the city of Siófok in 2003.
The bus driver disregarded the signs and ran a red light.
In 2009, a derailment caused a tank car to explode as the train left Viareggio station in central Italy.
The resulting 32 deaths were the worst rail accident in Italy since 1978, when a train between Lecce and Milan collided with an express train between Venice and Rome, killing 50 people in Bologna.
In the United Kingdom, on October 5, 1999, the train leaving Paddington station disregarded the signs and collided with a regional express. A total of 31 people died and 245 were injured.
In Portugal, the most recent train accident occurred in January of this year, on the Minho line, when a train collided with a car at a level crossing, injuring one person (the driver of the car).
But it was in September 1985 that the worst accident in the history of the Portuguese railways occurred.
Near the Moimenta-Alcachafe station, on the Beira Alta line, a regional train collided with the Sud Express, leaving about 150 people dead and 64 missing. Figures that have never been fully confirmed.