Other than a sudden tilt of the train, Semeera TP and her family had felt nothing more when the Coromandel Express they were travelling on hit a goods train in a massive collision on Friday, June 2. It was only when they quickly got down from the train that they saw other bogies were badly hit and many people were out there, crying. Semeera, a municipal councillor in Payyannur of Kerala, was on the Chennai-bound train with her husband and son. All three of them are safe.
“There were only a few people in our compartment and no one was affected. It was dark when we got down from the train. But local people had come to help us carrying torches. One nice man helped us out of there. He took us through the goods train that our train had collided with, and then to the main road. That is when we saw a lot of bodies and blood of the dying and injured people,” 46-year-old Semeera tells TNM.
The family got on a taxi to Bhubaneswar and is now waiting for a special train arranged for the survivors to reach Chennai. Approximately 250 passengers have boarded this train, which will tentatively reach Chennai central station at 9 am on Sunday, June 4.
Sameera and family will head home to Kannur after that. They had got on from Santragachi to Howrah on the Coromandel Express to go to Chennai at 3.30 pm on Friday.
The Coromandel Express collided with the goods train on Friday evening, and was later hit by the Howrah-bound SMVT Bengaluru-Howrah Express. The train mishap resulted in the death of 270 people, and injured more than 900 others. Many people are still feared trapped dead inside the train, and the death toll may go up. The authorities are yet to start identifying the people who have died. Families will need to submit proof of identification to claim the bodies of deceased persons.