Prosecutors have issued an arrest warrant for the site manager, a truck believed to have caused the worst train crash in Taiwan in the last seven decades, with at least 51 dead.
An express train collided with a truck that slipped from the construction site on a slope, reaching the side of the rails. The driver suspects that he did not pull the truck’s parking brake correctly.
The train, carrying nearly 500 passengers, was en route from Taipei, the capital of Taiwan, to Taitung on the east coast of the island when it derailed in a tunnel just north of Hualien.
Yu Xiu-duan, Hualien’s chief prosecutor, told reporters late last night that an arrest warrant had been issued for the site manager and that the matter was now being handled by the judiciary.
“In order to safeguard the evidence, we have teams of prosecutors on the ground and we are investigating the points that are needed,” she added.
Workers today began moving the back of the train, which suffered relatively little damage, stopped outside the tunnel.
The heavily damaged train carriages are still deformed in the tunnel.
President Tsai Ying-wen is expected to visit survivors in Hualien today. Her government declared three days of national mourning and ordered flags to be flown at half-mast in public buildings.
146 passengers who were injured in the accident are being treated in hospitals.
The tragedy occurred on the first day of a three-day celebration. The train was full of tourists and citizens going to their particular homelands. The dead included a French national, two Japanese nationals and a Macau resident, according to authorities.
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