No one injured in UK rail crash

Two trains collided and carriages were derailed near Lewes in southern England last night but there were no reports of injuries…

Two trains collided and carriages were derailed near Lewes in southern England last night but there were no reports of injuries, police said.

Safety on British railways has been under the spotlight since October 5th when a crash near London's Paddington station left at least 30 people dead.

"Two trains have been derailed but they are still upright and we do not believe that there are any injuries," a spokesman for local police said of the latest accident.

A spokesman for British Transport Police said the incident, which took place shortly after 7 p.m., may have been caused by a driver failing to stop for a red light.

READ MORE

"The commuter train hit the other empty depot train, but it is too early to say why. Early indications are it is possible it could have gone through a red light." The British Transport Police spokesman said it was too early to confirm the cause of the crash but added: "It is possible that it went through a red signal."

The train was doing fewer than 15 m.p.h. when the crash happened and no one was injured, he said.

A police spokesman said: "What we've been told so far is that two trains have gone into each other at fairly low speeds. One or two carriages may have derailed, but we don't believe any of them have turned over.

"We believe one of them was an empty carriage and the other was a 12-carriage train with some passengers on board." The Connex Victoria to Hastings 17.53 collided with an empty Seaford to Brighton train. The impact caused one of the carriages of the occupied train to derail, said a Railtrack spokesman. But the carriage did not topple over.