BRITAIN: Three people were killed and six injured yesterday when an express train collided in central England with a minibus full of passengers believed to be immigrant farm workers.
In the latest accident on Britain's rail system, the London-bound train crashed into the vehicle as it was crossing the track in Worcestershire at about 7.20 a.m.
"There are three fatalities," British Transport Police Chief Inspector Colin Edwards told reporters at the scene.
"There were five other people taken from the vehicle to hospital. Two of them are seriously injured," he said.
"They are all thought to be of Middle Eastern origin," he said, adding that one person on the train was slightly injured in the collision that happened on a remote crossing in the middle of farmland.
Chief Insp Edwards said drivers were supposed to stop and use a telephone at the crossing to call the local rail signal box before proceeding, but there was no record of such a call being made.
The crash by the First Great Western train on the Hereford to London line was being treated as a road accident, not a rail accident as the train did not derail, said a spokesman for Network Rail which runs Britain's rail system. - (Reuters)