Ten people were killed and at least 81 injured on Tuesday when two passenger trains collided head-on at high speed in remote countryside in southern Germany. The system is meant to prevent collisions by triggering an alarm if two trains are on the same stretch of track, and was introduced across the German rail network after two trains crashed in Saxony Anhalt in January 2011, killing 10. According to reports two Meridian passenger trains, part of the Transdev group, struck each other in a head-on collision approximately 60 kilometres (37 miles) from Munich. He added: “We expect that both drivers did not have sight contact previously and, therefore, collided without being able to brake or slow down”.
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Ambulances could not reach the site, which was heavily wooded with a steep hill on one side and a river on the other, so helicopters had to airlift people to nearby hospitals.
The two train drivers are thought to be among the dead, authorities said.
The crash happened during the morning rush-hour about half way along a six-km (four-mile) stretch between the spa town of Bad Aibling and Kolbermoor in Bavaria, near to the border with Austria.
“We need to find out know what happened, if the cause of the crash was based on the technology or human failure”, he said. Blue, yellow and silver metal debris was strewn around the crash site next to a river in the southern state of Bavaria.
In Munich, the city blood center put out an urgent call for donations in the wake of the crash.
“This is the biggest accident we have had in years in this region and we have many emergency doctors, ambulances and helicopters on the scene”, police spokesperson Stefan Sonntag told reporters.
Two black boxes from the trains were being examined for information about the reason for the collision.
Train operator Bayerische Oberlandbahn said it had started a hotline for family and friends to check on passengers.
The deputy police president, Robert Kopp, told the press conference the trains were carrying 150 passengers.
Dobrindt, however, said it was too early to draw a definitive conclusion. Trains were not crowded on Tuesday due to the local carnival holiday in Bavaria.
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“We will do everything to help travellers, their relatives and our employees”.
