Dozens injured as 2 trains collide in Moscow

Several dozen people have reportedly been injured after a train going from Moscow to Brest collided with a commuter train. The emergency brakes of the commuter train are said to have malfunctioned after an urgent halt to save a man on the tracks.

Four carriages were derailed, with one turning upside down and visibly wrecked, as shown on footage filmed by eyewitnesses, RT reports.

“At that moment 445 passengers and a train crew were on board a long-distance train, and the driver, his assistant and two ticket inspectors were on the inter-urban train,” said the Investigative Committee's spokesperson, Tatiana Morozova, as cited by RIA Novosti. She added that among those who were hospitalized are the crew of the long-distance train and both ticket inspectors.

Conflicting reports about the number of the injured and those who asked for medical assistance in the aftermath of the incident have been incoming.

Revealing early details of the incident, the head of the Moscow branch of the Emergencies Ministry, Ilya Denisov, has confirmed that the crash was triggered by the decision of the commuter train’s driver to pull the emergency stop to save the life of a person on the tracks.  

“To prevent the train from running over a person, the driver pulled the emergency brake, as result of which the normal operation of the brake system was disrupted,” Denisov said. The driver of the long-distance train, which was closely following the commuter train, also activated the train's emergency brakes, but the distance between the two turned to be too small to avert the collision, he said.

A special commission will be set up to investigate the circumstances that led to the collision, Sergey Zheltov, first deputy head of the Moscow branch of the Emergencies Ministry stated.