Subway Trains Crash in China, 240 Injured
Two metro trains collided in Shanghai on Tuesday, injuring more than 240 people, the system operator said, just months after a deadly high-speed rail crash that shocked China.
The firm blamed the accident on a signal failure -- the same cause as a July train crash that killed at least 40 people and shook public confidence in China's vast rail network.
There were no immediate reports of any deaths from Tuesday's accident, but pictures posted on Chinese websites showed bloodied passengers, some lying on the floor apparently unconscious and others with injuries to their heads.
Local authorities were investigating the exact cause of the crash, in which one metro train rear-ended another, the official Xinhua news agency said.
"Police and armed police have been dispatched to the scene to help with the evacuation," the Shanghai Metro Company said in a statement, adding that most of the injuries were minor and nine stations on the line had been closed.
Police cordoned off streets around the Laoximen, or Old West Gate station, near Shanghai's old quarter, where around a dozen ambulances could be seen.
The metro company said 500 passengers had been evacuated from the trains and the injured taken to hospital.
China's hugely popular microblogs buzzed with criticism of the authorities in the hours that followed Tuesday's crash, with many accusing the government of failing to ensure passenger safety.
"This is the consequence of rapid development. In the end we have to seriously consider if we want GDP or a happy life," one blogger posted under the name Shaolei123.
"After this I won't dare take a subway," posted another.
The accident comes as China struggles to rebuild public trust in its vast rail system after a high-speed train crash near the eastern city of Wenzhou in July in which at least 40 died.
The results of an investigation into that accident have yet to be released, but officials have blamed the crash on a failure of the Chinese-built signaling system in use on the line.
A series of near misses have added to the mistrust in the system -- including one in July on the same line where Tuesday's accident occurred, in which a train took a wrong turn during peak hours due to a signal failure.
No one was hurt in the accident but passengers were alarmed by the mistake.
The crash in Wenzhou, a city south of Shanghai, was the worst ever to hit China's high-speed train network, raising questions about whether safety had been overlooked in the rush to develop China's vast railway system.
The Chinese government suspended approval of all new railway construction projects after the Wenzhou crash and cut the speed of trains running on newly-built high-speed lines.
Shanghai opened its first metro line in 1995. It currently has 11 lines covering more than 420 kilometers and carries nearly five million passengers a day, according to figures from the operator.