Last Friday morning, a train derailed in the northern province of Nam Dinh when it slammed into an idle truck. Railway officials told Thanh Nien that the vehicle had been parked on an illegal road that spans the train tracks.
The derailment occurred when driver, Chu Huy Thang, parked on the tracks to deliver rice to a Viet Trung Company warehouse. At around 2:15am, 5 minutes after Thang left the vehicle, the train slammed into the back of the truck and the locomotive “was thrown across National Highway 10.”
Fortunately, the 315 passengers onboard were unhurt, but the tracks were not cleared until the following day, necessitating the transport of over 1,000 passengers by bus.
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Nguyen Van Doanh, deputy head of the Railway Authority at the Ministry of Transport, said that the illegal road is one of 4,500 that crisscross Vietnam’s train tracks which account for the majority of railway accidents in the country.
Doanh cited “a shortage of funds and relocation problems to account for the slow progress,” in building official crossings.
Perhaps Railway officials should consider addressing the issue of illegal roads before spending $8 million on electronic ticketing systems.
