The day was calm and bright. I was travelling in a train. For some hours railways train ran smooth with usual moderate speed. The passengers were playing cards or talking. Some passengers were dozing and sleeping.
All of a sudden, we felt terrible jerks. The goods and trunks which were placed on the upper berth fell down, hitting and injuring many passengers. There were shrieks and screams. Women began to weep, men were groaning out of pain. Children were crying due to fear and pain. My head collided with another seat and I was hurt and got slight wounds. There was a complete chaos and confusion. Those who were in the front of carriages felt shock more than the others. Luckily our compartment was safe. I peeked out of my window and saw that the bogies attached in the front were entirely derailed.
Soon it was known that our train had come into a violent collision with another train. That happened only some yards away from the nearest train. The signals had blundered in showing the same line to both the trains. The drivers of both the trains were helpless as they discovered this fault when it was too late so the trains collided.
The smash was terrible. The first three or four carriages were completely destroyed. Some carriages were overturned. The passengers in first two carriages suffered most. Some died on the spot. Some were terribly wounded and some were slightly. It was a very pathetic and pitiable sight.
After some time medical van and railway police arrived. General Manager accompanied with other officers reached at the place of accident. The injured and the wounded were rushed to the nearly hospital. The dead bodies were sent for postmortem. General Manager announced fifty thousand rupees each to the next relative of dead person and twenty thousand rupees to seriously injure and five thousand rupees to slightly injured person.
Vocabulary
All of a sudden—suddenly
Jerks—shocks
Terrible—awful
