CFF rail traffic disrupted Monday afternoon
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Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Two people were seriously injured and had to be cut from their car and a third person was slightly injured in an accident that disrupted Lausanne-Bern trains for nearly four hours Monday afternoon 6 December. The two cars collided and one of them fell 10 metres from a bridge, onto the rail line below. The accident occurred when a car going up the Avenue du Léman was hit by a car coming from Chemin de Bonne-Espérance. The first car slid and went into the bridge railing, which gave way.
Emergency authorities promptly alerted the CFF rail company, which halted train traffic on the line.
Last three cars of the Glacier Express that crashed 23 July 2010
Sion, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The 23 July 2010 accident on one of Switzerland’s most popular tourist attractions, the Glacier Express, was due entirely to the driver having an inexplicable blackout, the federal public transport specialist who has overseen the investigation told Sonntags Blick magazine.
There was no pressure on him to accelerate too soon to make up lost time, nor were there technical problems with the train or the rail line. The 34-year-old driver told his employer, the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn line, that he had a blackout at the moment he accelerated from 35 to 56 kph, against company regulations.
A Japanese tourist died when the train derailed in the Goms valley, and 42 people were injured.
Background story, GenevaLunch, 24 July 2010
Seventeen people travelling in a mini-bus near Nowe Miasto in Poland, 80 km south of Warsaw, died following a head-on crash with a truck, reports AP. The driver of the truck is injured, but his life is reportedly not in danger. Foggy roads appear to have been a factor in the crash. The Volkswagen van was carrying “far more” people than is legally allowed, apparently seasonal farm workers heading for apple and plum orchards to pick fruit.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Geneva has seen an unusual traffic accident judgement, reports 20 Minutes, with the police department obliged to pay for a crashed car, hit by a police officer who was speeding to answer a call. Witnesses said the man, who had a blood alcohol level of 2.98, nearly six times the legal limit, had gone through a stoplight at the Place Jargonnant in Geneva when the light was green. He was hit by a police car that ran the light going 72 kph, a speed the investigation into the accident called “inappropriate”, despite wailing sirens. One of the police officers was seriously injured in the 4 June accident and the cars were totalled.
The investigation has resulted in the police insurance company reimbursing the drunk driver completely for his Audi A6, but his license has been taken from him.
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Five people are dead but 24 remain in critical condition and at least 20 more are injured following what is being called Portugal’s worst-ever road crash. A series of accidents occurred Monday afternoon, the first one around 15:00, on the A25 near the city of Aveiro (map), with poor visibility due to a mix of rain and smoke blowing onto the road most likely responsible for the accidents. Some 200 firefighters were called to the scene, with several of the injured cut out of their cars.
Following too closely and travelling at unsuitably high speeds for conditions are being blamed, as well, for the pileup.
Links to other sites: Euronews, Noticeas de Aveiro (Por)
A tourist plane carrying 14-15 people, mostly foreign tourists according to early reports, crashed early Tuesday 24 August in the Himalayas near the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu, after their plane was unable to land in Lukla, a popular trekking area in the Everest region. There are reportedly no survivors. Bad weather, with heavy rain and poor visibility, is hampering rescue workers, according to a government ministry. Foreign embassies, including the US, are trying to determine if their citizens were on board; four Americans and one Japanese were reportedly among the passengers, but the government has not given details about the others.
Links to other sites: AFP/France24, BBC, Channelnewsasia
One person died in the crash of a Colombian airliner that was carrying 131 people, but 124 are injured, with several of them in critical condition. The plane was split in two as it landed on San Andres island at 01:42 Monday morning 16 August. Bad weather was listed as the cause by some officials, while others reported that the plane was hit by lightning.
(CNN amateur video) Six people died at the scene and two more in hospital, after a night-time off-road race crash in the Mojave desert in southern California. The 200-mile race was run at night to avoid the desert heat east of Los Angeles in the Lucerne Valley area of San Bernardino County. Spectators are warned to stay well back and the course is barricaded in places where excitement is bound to occur, such as jumps, but the crowd can be difficult to control, say observers, but opinions are mixed about the safety of such races.
Link to CNN
Video
Last three cars of the Glacier Express that crashed 23 July
Sion / Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) - Human error appears to have been the cause of the Glacier Express train accident that killed one person and sent 40 others to hospital 23 July.
The initial report on the crash by officials of the Matterhorn Gotthard rail company shows that the driver was going too fast on the line, about 55 kph in a section where the speed is limited to 35 kph.
The speed limit rises just after the area where three cars derailed, and the driver appears to have increased his speed too soon.
The investigating judge will now determine to what extent the conductor is at fault. He has worked for the company for eight years and has never had an accident.
Eight people remain in hospital, according to police.
Other stories on the Glacier Express accident on GenevaLunch.
Update 3 17:00 An Airblue plane with 152 people on board has crashed in Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, and authorities now say all those aboard were killed (ed. note: earlier reports that indicated there were some survivors were wrong). The plane was en route from Karachi to Islamabad, and it crashed in the Margalla Hills due to bad weather, shortly before landing. Rescue workers have reached the area, using helicopters, but heavy fog is hampering rescuers. Ninety bodies have been recovered.
Airblue is a low-cost airline that flies mainly within Pakistan, offering several daily flights between Karachi and Islamabad. It also flies to five cities in the Middle East and Europe but does not fly to Turkey.
Times of India carries a list of the passengers on the plane.
Links to other sites: CNN, Geo-TV Pakistan (CNN affiliate), NDTV, Reuters
The pilot of a CF-18 fighter jet that crashed spectacularly during a practice run before a Canadian air show in Alberta, is in hospital, but his injuries are not life-threatening say officials. He ejected just seconds before his jet nose-dived and the pilot, who has “vast experience” with the plane hit the ground hard about 100 metres from the ball of flame. Bystanders who witnessed the accident, interviewed by CNN, were clearly shaken.
Video, CNN
Trains expected to run by Sunday
Last three cars of the Glacier Express that crashed 23 July
Update 24 July 16:40 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – The Glacier Express train crash that killed one person and injured 42 others Friday 23 July in the Goms Valley could have been due to technical problems, possibly linked to warm weather, say officials of the company that owns it, MGB.
One hypothesis is that the rails may have been deformed by dramatic shifts in the weather in the hours preceding the crash. After days of very hot dry weather the temperature suddenly dropped several degrees and heavy showers fell along the Alpine ridges in the area. An investigation has been opened to determine the cause of the crash, which occurred at noon Friday 23 July. A 64-year-old Japanese man from Osaka has been identified as the one person who died, but two women, both Japanese, remain in critical condition. Among the 42 injured, most were Japanese, but the group includes five Swiss, four Spanish, two Austrian and one Indian traveller.
The trains are likely to be running again Sunday, once the derailed train is placed back on the track and removed, and the line checked, according to the company. It said Friday evening trains on the line could be operating by Saturday but work has taken longer than expected. The cars involved in the crash are being set aside for investigators.
The Glacier Express carries some 250,000 people a year. It went into operation in 1930 and this is its first accident. The train has an average speed of 30kph, earning it the nickname of the “slowest train in the world.”
It runs on a single track and between Zermatt and St Moritz it goes through 91 tunnels and crosses 291 bridges, covering some of Switzerland’s most spectacular Alpine scenery in the process, making it a hugely popular tourist attraction.
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – A 20-year-old driver veered into the scene of an accident in Lausanne in the early hours of Thursday, hitting a police car, one police officer standing at the back of the car, and three passengers from a car that had had an accident an hour earlier. All five ended up at the Chuv university hospitals with serious injuries.
The first accident occured at 01:20, when the driver of a car became drowsy and drove off the A1 autoroute between the Maladiere and Malley exits, and up a bank. The car was heading towards Lausanne. No one was injured. At 02:30, while police were investigating the accident and making their report, their vehicle parked in the emergency lane with lights flashing and accident signs out to warn motorists, the driver of the second car drove off the road and into the police car.
The Glacier Express is one of Switzerland's most popular tourist attractions
[Video] Geneva and Sion, Switzerland (GenevaLunch.com) – One person is dead and 42 are injured, in a train crash in the Goms Valley Friday 23 July around noon.
Six of the injured are in critical condition and another six in serious condition, treated in Geneva and Lausanne as well as in regional hospitals. Most of victims are Japanese. Details are still coming in from cantonal police, but Kyodo News in Japan reports that the tourists were part of three different tour groups and most if not all were over age 50 and on one-week tours to Switzerland.
The Glacier Express, which links Zermatt to Andermatten, went off the rails between Lax and Fiesch, heading towards Oberwald.
According to a police spokesperson for canton Valais, the last two cars of the train, which were turned over on their side, were first class cars and could hold up to 30 passengers each. The train may have carried up to 210 people. (photos, TSR, by Keystone)
No cause has been given yet for the crash. The train is owned by 
the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn (MGB).
Heavy rains, thunderstorms and fog rolled through the area late Thursday and early Friday, but by early afternoon, with rescue work continuing in the area, skies were starting to clear.
The accident occurred not far from the place where a tourist bus crashed 13 June 2010, killing two Canadians and injuring 28.
Serious rail accidents with mortalities are extremely rare in Switzerland and the Friday accident “interrupts a long record” without deaths reports TSR; the most serious one was 112 years ago.
Video of the train crash – Swiss Television SF Video
Investigators have found the black box, which is intact, from the Air India Express flight that crashed when it overshot the runway, went over a cliff and burst into flames near Mangalore Saturday 22 May. The crash killed 158 people; eight people are being treated in hospital. Those who died were reportedly burned in the fire. The airport is on a kind of tabletop, with a deep ravine next to it.
Links to other sites: Reuters, India, Times of India
Searchers have reportedly spotted part of a Pamir Airways passenger plane that disappeared Monday, carrying 43 people to Kabul from Kunduz in the north of the country. Six of the passengers were foreign nationals, including one American and three British citizens. Bad weather with poor visibility over the Hindu Kush is suspected to have caused the crash, but it now appears that the plane crashed closer to Kabul than originally thought.
Links to other sites: Independent, Sky
Sole survivor’s aunt and uncle arrive in Tripoli
The Dutch child who is the sole survivor of the privately-owned Afriqiyah Air crash in Tripoli 12 May, an eight-year-old named Ruben, has been joined there by his aunt and uncle. His parents and older brother were killed in the crash and while he does not have life-threatening injuries, he has had surgery for multiple fractures to the lower half of his body and he’s under sedation, reports CNN. Investigators have the flight data recorder and are studying it to determine the cause of the crash.
Meanwhile, Dutch authorities now say that the flight, from Johannisburg in South Africa to Tripoli, was carrying 70 and not 58 Dutch citizens, as earlier reported. The other nationalities on the flight: six South Africans, two Libyans, two Austrians, one German, one French person, one Zimbabwean and two British citizens but the nationalities of others have not yet been provided to media. Politicians in The Netherlands have suspended their campaigns for parliamentary elections in June, to mourn the crash victims.
Links to other sites: Aljazeera, Radio Netherlands
Paris, France (GenevaLunch) – An area 5km by 5km has been pinpointed, say French authorities, where the black box from the Rio to Paris Air France flight AF447 disappeared inexplicably 1 June 2009. New technology has made it possible to get a more precise location, and the French government has requested that the search continue. One of the more unusual details to come out of French coverage of the missing plane is that an American victim had a payout “value” for his of her family, according to Le Monde, 16 times higher than the value of a European victim. All 228 on board the plane were killed.
Links to other sites: Business Week, Le Monde (Fre)
Paris, France (GenevaLunch) – Eurostar will not be running trains in or out of Brussels, Belgium for a second day, following the train crash near Brussels Monday 15 February that killed 18 people. Passengers with tickets are asked to exchange them for a later date or they can ask for a refund. Paris trains are operating normally and Lille service is suffering some delays. Contact: Eurostar.
Martigny, Valais, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The autoroute near Martigny was closed for nearly two hours Monday evening after a driver lost control of his car, which flipped over and crashed into a concrete block. The driver was in very serious condition at the Sion hospital. Parts of the A9 and A21 were closed for part of the evening after the accident.
Meyrin, Geneva (GenevaLunch) - The driver who died when her car caught fire late Sunday night in Meyrin has not been officially identified, while police await the results of an autopsy on the person they describe only as a 72-year-old woman. According to the Tribune de Geneve the driver was from Vaud, a musician who had just given a concert, followed by a small celebration, and she was heading home to Begnins.
The circumstances surrounding the accident remain unclear, with police saying she drove up onto a pedestrian area and into a post in the area between the town hall and the Forum Meyrin. For reasons not yet understood, she appears to have left her foot on the gas pedal while the car was blocked, causing the tires to explode and the fire to start.
Update 24 November 07:50 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Police continue to investigate the accident that put a 70-year-old man in hospital in serious condition Thursday 19 November after his Golf was hit by a Lamborghini Murcielago in Genthod, on the lake road. The driver was a 22-year-old Russian with an alcohol level of 1.11 per 1,000 (legal limit in Switzerland is 0.5), with a drivers license that is not valid in Switzerland. The car had Geneva plates. The Tribune de Geneve carries a front page story about the accident, suggesting that it was the result of a race or chase by four flash cars whose owners were trying to see which car is the fastest, a suggestion that other media have carried.
Geneva police spokesperson Patrick Pulh told GenevaLunch that police have not, in fact, been able to establish if there was any kind of race. “These cars make a lot of noise even when they are just idling.” he notes. “We haven’t been able to establish the speed at which they were going.” The ongoing investigation is seeking to clarify the roles of all the drivers involved, he says, and it’s difficult at this stage to say how long it will take.
Update 15:40 An express train has rammed into another train in a station in Mathura, Uttar Pradesh state, in northern India and left at least 22 people dead and more than 50 injured early Wednesday 21 October. Rescue workers are still cutting people out ofthe crumpled wagons. Romandie News, Times of India
Paris, France (GenevaLunch) – Renault has announced that it will not fight charges it plotted to have one of its drivers, Nelson Piquet Jr, crash during the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix, in order to let another teammate, Swis-based Fernando Alonso, to move ahead. The crash was reportedly planned to leave debris on the track, causing a “safety car” incident, and Piquet’s confession, available online, appears to provide evidence. Alonso, who was well down the field before the crash, went on to win.
A helicopter and small Piper plane collided in mid-air over the Hudson River between Hoboken, New Jersey and Manhattan, New York, in the US Saturday, presumably killing all nine people aboard, although so far only two bodies have been found. Five Italian tourists were in the helicopter, touring the area. New York Times, Reuters
Budapest, Hungary (GenevaLunch) - Felipe Massa left hospital and joined his wife Raffaela, six months pregnant, to return by private jet to his home in Brazil. He was seriously injured during the qualifying stages for the Hungarian Grand Prix when a spring that had fallen off compatriot Rubens Barrichello’s car struck his helmet. Massa said that he remembers nothing of the crash and will wait until he sees how he recuperates before deciding whether to return to racing. Michael Schumacher is coming out of retirement to replace Massa in the Ferrari team.
Details: The Times
Budapest, Hungary (GenevaLunch) - Fernando Alonso will start on pole position at the Hungarian Grand Prix after an incident-packed qualifying session which saw Felipe Massa taken to hospital by helicopter after crashing at 200 kph. The Brazilian Ferrari driver has undergone emergency surgery after suffering skull damage and concussion, reports the BBC. Ferrari says he will remain under observation in intensive care.
To those of you who subscribe to our Google/Feedburner rss e-mail feed, please note that it failed to include several articles from Wednesday 15 July. We’re sorry that you missed them and unfortunately have no explanation for this, but here they are: EPFL mathematicians crack elliptical curve encryption problem, Vaud and Schumacher agree to small dock, shoreline group opposed, Alinghi accused by US club of secretly plotting with Intl Sailing Federation, C0ngo people fail to get Mobutu money, Soldier killed, another injured, in parachute crash
A Caspian Airlines plane carrying 168 people crashed, killing all those aboard, about 15 minutes after takeoff, near the Iranian city of Qazvin, Iranian media report. The flight was headed towards neighbouring Armenai. The cause of the crash is not yet clear. The aircraft was a Tupolev Tu-154. Reuters
Thirteen bodies have washed up on the Tanzanian island of Mafia (map), along with debris, and they are thought to be those of victims of the Comoros archipelago crash of a Yemeni airliner in 1 July. Officials say DNA tests will be needed to identify them. The island is south of Dar es Salaam, not far from the mainland. BBC
