Rescuers race to free survivors trapped inside train after fatal crash in Indonesia

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - JAKARTA — Rescuers are racing to free people trapped inside a train involved in a fatal collision outside the Indonesian capital Jakarta on Monday.
At least 14 people were killed and dozens injured in the accident which took place when a stationary passenger train was hit from behind by a long-distance commuter train running on the same track, the train operator said on Tuesday, as rescuers worked to extract survivors still trapped in the wreckage.
The collision happened late on Monday in Bekasi, just outside Jakarta.
Local media ran footage of passengers on medical trolleys near Bekasi Timur Station, with other images showing rescuers trying to free people from the train wreckage.
There are still victims who are alive "but they're pinned by train material", Mohammad Syafii, who leads Indonesia's search and rescue agency, told a press conference early on Tuesday.
Syafii said it was a delicate process to rescue survivors from the mangled carriages.
“We needed to involve personnel with certain skills to perform a measured extrication,” he said. “There are some victims who are alive to this minute and we’re hoping to extricate them, but they’re still pinned by the train material.”
Bobby Rasyidin, the president director of state-owned railway operator KAI, said on Tuesday that 84 people are being treated for their injuries in nearby hospitals.
One survivor told of the moments after a long-distance train slammed into the stationary commuter train she was in, trapping people inside mangled carriages.
“I thought I was going to die,” Sausan Sarifah, 29, said from her bed at the RSUD Bekasi hospital, where she was admitted with a broken arm and a deep cut to one thigh.
She was on her way home from work, she said, when her train stopped at the Bekasi Timur station about 25km (15 miles) from Jakarta.
“It all happened so fast, in a split second,” Sausan said.
“There were two announcements from the commuter train. Everyone was ready to get off, and then suddenly there was the sound of the locomotive, really loud,” she said.
“There was no time to get out, and everyone ended up piled up inside the train, crushed on top of one another. I don’t know how the person underneath me is doing.”
She said she had feared suffocating to death in the human pile-up, and worried that some pinned underneath did not survive.
“Thank God I was on top, so I could be evacuated quickly,” Sausan said.
According to Franoto Wibowo, a spokesperson for rail operator KAI, a taxi appeared to have clipped the commuter train on a level crossing, causing it to come to a standstill on the tracks, where it was hit.
A second train was forced to stop at the station because of this collision. Nearly an hour later, the third train, a long-distance commuter train, then crashed into a women-only carriage on the second train, while pulling into the station.
All the victims were in the commuter train, and all of about 240 passengers on the other train had been evacuated safely, according to Purba.
At the station, chaotic scenes unfolded in the aftermath of the crash, with rescue workers shouting for oxygen tanks as ambulances stood by in a snaking queue, lights flashing.
An AFP reporter at the scene witnessed people being carried out of the wreckage on gurneys and loaded into waiting ambulances as hundreds of bystanders looked on, some seemingly in shock.
As rescuers worked to free many more trapped in the crushed train carriages, an Indonesian deputy house speaker, Sufmi Dasco Ahmad, said at the scene that the toll could continue to rise.
Franoto told Kompas TV the military, fire brigade, national search and rescue agency and Red Cross were aiding in the evacuation effort.
Rescuers were “carrying out the evacuation process for the trapped victims using extrication equipment to free them from the wrecked train structures”, the Jakarta search and rescue agency said.
The collision caused “significant damage to several train carriages”, it said.
Medical expenses for the injured and funeral expenses for the deceased will be fully covered by KAI and insurance, authorities say, adding that the Bekasi Timur Station will be closed to commuters for the rest of Tuesday.
Indonesia's public transport network in general has a high accident rate, due in part to ageing infrastructure and poor maintenance.
The last major train crash in the south-east Asian country killed four crew members and injured about two dozen people elsewhere in West Java province in January 2024. — Agencies