CAIRO: At least 45 people were killed and 80 injured on Wednesday when a truck failed to stop at a level crossing and pushed waiting traffic into the path of a speeding train in northern Egypt, police said.
At approximately 5 pm, the truck ploughed into traffic at the level crossing, including a bus and at least four other vehicles including a bus, pushing them into the path of the passenger train.
Two train carriages overturned and another two were derailed, a police official said, requesting anonymity.
The accident occurred 80 km east of Marsa Matruh in the Mediterranean coastal region of Dabaa, the official said.
Sources told Daily News Egypt that by 7 pm 40 ambulances were on site, with reinforcements from Cairo and other governorates on the way.
The crash is the latest in a series of transport disasters in Egypt, most of which have been blamed on negligence and poor maintenance.
At least 58 people were killed and 144 injured in August 2006 when a passenger train slammed into the back of another on the same track, derailing carriages and setting one train ablaze.
Egypt s deadliest rail disaster occurred in February 2002, when a passenger using a stove set ablaze a train heading to the south of the country, killing at least 361 people. -AFP with additional reporting by Daily News Egypt
