1994 Tolunda rail disaster

Last updated

1994 Tolunda rail disaster
Benguela zug.jpg
Example of a 1990s Benguela railway freight train with fare-dodgers
Details
Date22 September 1994
Locationnear Tolunda, Namibe Province
Country Angola
Owner Benguela railway
Statistics
Trains1
Passengershundreds of fare-dodgers
Deaths300 [1] [2]
Injured146 [1] -147 [2]

The 1994 Tolunda rail disaster happened near Tolunda, in the Namibe Province, Angola on 22 September 1994. A freight train of the Benguela railway derailed due to malfunctioning brakes and crashed into a 10 metres deep ravine. 300 people died and around 147 people were injured.

Contents

It is among the deadliest train disasters in history. [3] [4]

Background

The disaster took place during the Angolan Civil War, but the location of the disaster was largely outside the area of the civil war. [5]

The disaster

On Thursday 22 September 1994 a freight of the Benguela railway was en voyage in Angola with a cargo of granite blocks and with many fare-dodgers onboard. [6] Near Tolunda, in the Namibe Province 190 kilometres from Lubango, the train derailed and crashed into a ten meters deep ravine. [2] The accident location was in a very remote area and as so the rescue operation and other help arrived very late. [5]

Initial sources reported a death toll of 146 people. [5] The final official death toll was published by the Angola Press News Agency a week after the disaster on 29 September. The disaster caused 300 casualties and 146 [1] -147 [2] others being injured. Most of the victims were inside the wagons with granite blocks. [2]

The cause of the disaster was malfunctioning of the brakes. [2]

See also

Related Research Articles

The Yanga derailment occurred on 21 June 2010 when a train traveling between Brazzaville and Pointe Noire in the Republic of the Congo was derailed and plunged into a ravine. At least 60 people were initially reported to have been killed and hundreds disappeared with the death toll expected to rise further. The death toll had risen to 76 people and the injury toll had risen to 745 by 23 June 2010.

The Bouhalouane train crash was a fatal railway accident that happened at Bouhalouane in Algeria on January 27, 1982 at 01:30 and killed 131 people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1856 Schiedam train accident</span>

On 10 August, 1856 two passenger trains collided at the Amsterdam–Haarlem–Rotterdam railway near Delfshaven between Schiedam Centrum station and Rotterdam Centraal station, the Netherlands. Two carriages where destroyed with a third being severely damaged. Three passengers lost their lives and at least nine were injured.

On 26 February 1965 a passengers train collided head on with a freight train 100 kilometres east of Khartoum, Sudan killing 100-120 people.

On 4 October 1965, during the Apartheid in South Africa, a passenger train of the South African Railways with up to 1500 black commuters onboard derailed, killing 87 of them.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "300 doden treinongeluk Angola". Leeuwarder Courant (in Dutch). 30 September 1994 – via Delpher.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Tol treinramp in Angola: 300 doden". Amigoe (in Dutch). 30 September 1994 – via Delpher.
  3. ↑ "Notable International Rail Accidents". CNN . 22 October 2013.
  4. ↑ "World's worst rail disasters". BBC . 19 December 2007.
  5. 1 2 3 "Treinramp Angola". Trouw (in Dutch). 27 September 1994 – via Delpher.
  6. ↑ Peter W. B. Semmens: Katastrophen auf Schienen. Eine weltweite Dokumentation. Transpress, p. 225, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-344-71030-3

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.