5 killed in West Bengal train crash

At least five people were killed and 30 injured as a goods train smashed into the rear of a passenger train in India's West Bengal state on Monday.

A police official said rescue teams worked to extricate others feared trapped.

Media showed images of the pile-up, with containers from the goods train strewn on the tracks and one carriage nearly vertical in the air in the accident, which followed another a year ago that was the worst in more than 20 years.

The goods train hit the Kanchanjunga Express, which was on its way to Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, from the northeastern state of Agartala, causing three carriages of the passenger train to go off the rails.

“So far, five people are dead and we have rescued 25 to 30 injured,” Abhishek Roy, a senior police official in the eastern state's district of Darjeeling, where the accident happened, told a news agency.