Rescuers combed Wednesday through the mangled wreckage of a train derailment in Philadelphia that left at least five dead, as the difficult search for possible survivors continued.
Rescuers combed Wednesday through the mangled wreckage of a train derailment in Philadelphia that left at least five dead, as the difficult search for possible survivors continued.
Mayor Michael Nutter said the death toll could rise from the accident on the busy northeast US rail corridor as some of the 243 people on the train had not been accounted for.
He gave the injury toll as 65 but local media said during the night that it had risen to more than 140, based on a tally of people sent to local hospitals.
Witnesses said the front of Amtrak Train 188, heading from Washington DC to New York, shook as it went into a turn and crashed at about 9:30 pm on Tuesday (0130 GMT Wednesday).
Shell-shocked and bleeding travelers were seen limping from the wreckage, while rescue teams with flashlights searched the seven derailed cars of the train, one of which was completely flattened.
Wheels from the train cars lay scattered by the tracks.
The cause of the crash, which came as the train negotiated a long bend, was not immediately known, although there has been no indication that it was a terrorist attack. Nutter refused to speculate on whether it was going too fast.
"It is an absolute disastrous mess," Nutter told reporters.
"I have never seen anything like this in my life."
Max Helfman, 19, was with his mother in the last car of the train, which had no seatbelts, when they suddenly felt it shake and the car then flipped over.
"People were thrown to the ground," Helfman told the Philadelphia Inquirer.
"Chairs inside the train became unscrewed and suitcases were falling on people. My mother flew into me and I literally had to catch her. People were bleeding from their head. It was awful."
Hydraulic tools had to be used to remove passengers from some of the most badly damaged train cars, firefighters said.
"I've never seen anything so devastating. They are in pretty bad shape," said Fire Commissioner Derrick Sawyer, referring to the train cars.
