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Trip from Berlin towards Halle canceledOverhead line breaks and falls on ICE train: hundreds of passengers are stranded
from Stefanie Gutierrez and Camilla Koziol
Two injured!
An ICE is on its way from Berlin to Halle on Saturday afternoon (April 11th). Suddenly the overhead wire breaks and falls on the train. At one point, the train's windows were damaged and two passengers were slightly injured as a result, a railway spokeswoman reported to the dpa.
Subsequent trains will be rerouted
A spokesman for the Wittenberg district said that, according to information he had, two people on board collapsed due to “panic and circulation”. However, a rescue base set up as a precautionary measure at Lutherstadt-Wittenberg train station was ultimately not needed to care for the injured.
According to the railway, the incident occurred shortly before Wittenberg in Saxony-Anhalt, near the town of Zahna. The cause was a technical error, as the police confirmed to RTL. The police initially say that a diesel locomotive will tow the train and possibly take the passengers to Wittenberg.
But the railway later contradicts this on its homepage: “The onward journey takes place in buses. A replacement train cannot be used due to the power being switched off. Trains between Berlin-Halle-Leipzig are currently being rerouted via Dessau and Wiesenburg. This will result in an extension of the journey time of around 40 minutes. The Lutherstadt Wittenberg stop is no longer necessary, the replacement stop is Dessau.”
According to a dpa reporter on site, the ICE was ultimately able to drive independently to Lutherstadt-Wittenberg train station in the evening, where passengers could change trains. The district spokesman confirmed the arrival of the ICE and that the travelers left Wittenberg in a replacement train at 6:48 p.m.
Damaged ICE continued under its own power
According to the district and fire department, the towing of the ICE with the passengers on board was planned in the late afternoon. A tow train from Deutsche Bahn was on site and pumped up the train with compressed air, it was said.
It was initially not known how long the repair of the cracked overhead line would affect rail traffic.
Sources used: Own RTL research, AFP, tagesschau.de, Bahn.dedpa
