OSLO — A passenger train derailed in northern Norway on Thursday, killing one person and injuring several others.
The train’s locomotive and first carriage were thrown off the tracks while it was traveling from Trondheim to Bodo.
“There were 90 passengers on board the train,” Bent Are Eilertsen, chief of staff for the Nordland police district, told the national broadcaster NRK.
He confirmed that one person had died in the accident, while three others were taken to hospital. However, there are no life-threatening injuries, he said.
The cause of the accident is still under investigation, with initial reports indicating that the culprit may have been a landslide.
One passenger described seeing a rock on the tracks. “We are up on the train tracks now and can clearly see that a rock has hit the train. Everyone in the first carriage is uninjured except for a minor ankle injury,” he told NRK.
“It is too early to say definitively what caused the derailment, but a landslide is a strong possibility,” said Harry Korslund, a press officer at Bane Nor, the operator of Norway’s rail infrastructure.
The E6 highway, which runs near the site of the accident, is closed as emergency services continue their work. Meanwhile, the rail track will remain closed for several days pending investigations, clean-up and repairs. Authorities have also engaged a geologist to evaluate the stability of the area after the landslide.
XINHUA