18 dead as Belgian trains collide near Brussels

The impact peeled away the front of one carriage and threw at least one other off the tracks, causing amputations and other severe injuries, witnesses and officials said. Train services across western Europe were disrupted.

The Flanders provincial crisis centre said in a statement carried by the Belgian media that at least 18 people were killed. Thirty survivors remained hospitalised, several of them in a "very serious" condition, the statement said.

Lodewijk De Witte, the governor of the province of Flemish Brabant, told reporters that one train "apparently did not heed a stop light".

The trains collided in light snow just outside of the station at Buizingen at about 8:30am (0730GMT).

The force of the collision smashed one train deep into the front of the other, tearing back the metal sides. The trains tipped high into the air and broke overhead power lines.

One of the front carriages appeared to have careened across the tracks, demolishing a maintenance shed next to the rail line. A high concrete wall around the train yard seemed to have kept debris from hitting nearby houses.

Belgian National Railways spokesman Jochen Goovaerts said his agency was awaiting the outcome of the investigation before discussing the cause of yesterday's accident.

"It was a nightmare," said passenger Christian Wampach, 47, after paramedics had bandaged his head at a sports complex where the less seriously injured were treated. Those more badly hurt were taken to several hospitals in and around Brussels. The Red Cross appealed for blood donations.

"We were thrown about for about 15 seconds. There were a number of people injured in my car, but I think all the dead were in the first car," said Mr Wampach, who was in the third carriage of the Brussels-bound train.

Photos from the scene showed rescuers pulling the wounded from a carriage that appeared to have tipped on its side. Others rushed victims on stretchers along the tracks.

"When we came out we saw dead bodies lying next to the tracks, some mutilated," said Patricia Lallemand, 40, who was in the same carriage as Mr Wampach but was unhurt.

Resident Wira Leire, 20, said he was woken by a loud crash and leapt to his bedroom window to see two carriages jack-knifed directly in front of his home.

"There were people lying on the ground next to the train, so I grabbed some blankets and ran into the back garden," he said. "But I couldn't climb over the concrete wall, so I just threw the blankets to the rescuers."

Belgian prime minister Yves Leterme cancelled a trip to Kosovo, turning around his plane minutes after landing at Pristina's main airport, the Kosovo prime minister's office said.

Eurostar reported on its website that its high-speed trains had suspended service in and out of Brussels and could remain shut down all day.

The international high-speed network Thalys, which links major cities in Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands, temporarily halted all traffic because its trains use the same rails as commuter lines near Halle, said company spokeswoman Patricia Baars.

At least four Thalys trains were stopped en route, and the railway operator deployed staff members to stations where the trains were rerouted to provide assistance to the passengers, she said.

"No (Thalys] train is moving for the moment … it's very hard to know today when services will resume," she said. "It appears this was a very severe accident."

Thalys has at least 25 round-trip trains operating between Paris and Brussels each day, plus seven linking Brussels and Amsterdam and six from Belgium to Cologne, Germany.

The disaster appears to be the country's worst train wreck since 1954, when a crash near Leuven killed 20 German football fans and seriously injured 40 others.

In 28 March, 2001, eight people died at Pcrot when a train crowded with passengers ploughed into an empty train driving on the wrong tracks.