"We are most sorry for failing to properly install new brakes," said
Chinese Minister of Railway Liu Zhijun, as he inspected the
devastation from yet another horrible train wreck that trans****tation
officials attribute to lax safety precautions.
"But as Americans like to say, **** happens!"
Minister of Trans****tation Li Shenglin seemed not to be too concerned.
"Before he died," Li explained to re****ters from Tibet, "honorable
engineer Deumpi Deung told his supervisor that he was distracted by a
young female passenger who entered his operator's compartment and
began fondling his crotch as the train sped at 116 miles per hour.
Obviously, no man could concentrate on his job under such exhilarating
cir***stances. He died happy, I'll wager!"
----------------------------
"70 Killed, 400 Hurt in Train Collision in China"
By Edward Cody
Wa****ngton Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, April 29, 2008; A12
BEIJING, April 28 -- A speeding express train derailed and crashed
into an oncoming regional train early Monday in eastern China,
throwing a dozen carriages down an embankment and killing at least 70
people, authorities said.
More than 400 people from both trains were injured, including four
French nationals who were hospitalized with broken bones, the official
New China News Agency re****ted, citing the Shandong provincial
government. No foreigners were re****ted among the dead.
An investigation panel set up by the State Council, or Cabinet, said
speeding was responsible for the collision, the official Xinhua News
Agency re****ted Tuesday. Authorities had earlier been quoted as saying
that human error was to blame.
The accident was believed to be China's worst in more than a decade.
Another collision killed 126 people in 1997, according to China's
NetEase Internet site.
The high-speed express train was traveling from Beijing to Qingdao, a
city on the Yellow Sea where China's best-known beer, Tsingtao, is
produced and where sailing races will be held during the summer's
Beijing Olympics. Many of the travelers were getting an early start on
China's traditional May Day holiday, which will begin Thursday.
The New China News Agency said the Qingdao-bound train slipped its
tracks about 4:40 a.m. near Zibo, 80 miles east of Jinan, the
provincial capital, and slammed into a train headed from nearby Yantai
to Xuzhou in neighboring Jiangsu province. The second train was
knocked from its rails by the impact.
Most passengers were asleep at the midway point of an overnight
journey. The news agency said its re****ters saw bloodstained sheets
and broken thermos bottles scattered about the crash site.
The official investigation showed that the train was traveling 81
miles per hour before the accident, far over the section's speed limit
of 50 mph, Xinhua said.
As roadbeds are improved, China has raised the permitted speed of its
express routes, with trains topping 130 mph in many areas.
Construction has begun on even faster trains, with speeds up to 200
mph, that will run between Beijing and Shanghai.
The accident was this year's second in Shandong province. A high-speed
train from Beijing to Qingdao plowed into a group of railway workers
in January, killing 18.
http://www.wa****ngtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/27/AR2008042702369.html
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