Relatives mourn China train crash victims
A derailed carriage of a bullet train is removed from a bridge as workers dig through the wreckage after a high speed train crashed into a stalled train in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province July 24, 2011. The crash occurred after the first train lost power due to a lightning strike and a bullet train following behind crashed into it, state television said, raising new questions about the safety of the fast-growing rail network. A derailed carriage of a bullet train is removed from a bridge as workers dig through the wreckage after a high speed train crashed into a stalled train in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province July 24, 2011. The crash occurred after the first train lost power due to a lightning strike and a bullet train following behind crashed into it, state television said, raising new questions about the safety of the fast-growing rail network.
Around two dozen grieving relatives of victims of a high-speed train crash lay flowers Friday at the site of the accident that killed at least 40 people and prompted a public outcry.
The family members gathered at the muddy spot under a viaduct from which four train cars plunged last Saturday after one bullet train rammed into another that had stalled after being hit by lightning in eastern China.
As a drizzle fell, relatives knelt and burned incense and paper near a pillar of the viaduct on which a poem mourning the crash victims had been scribbled. They declined to speak to the media.
Public anger has grown as the crash of the two high-speed trains near the eastern city of Wenzhou has come to be seen as emblematic of the problems with China's breakneck development over the past three decades, sometimes achieved at the expense of public safety and the environment.
A railway official said Thursday that design flaws in signal equipment and human error caused the crash.
The firing of three top officials at the Shanghai Railway Bureau has done little to tamp down criticism that authorities made incomplete attempts to rescue survivors while ordering tracks swiftly cleared to restore service.
State broadcaster CCTV said the death toll rose to 40 Friday when one of the more than 190 survivors died.
Reports even in the usually docile state-controlled media have called for greater transparency and accountability from authorities. On the popular Twitter-like site Sina Weibo users posted millions of messages, many questioning official explanations and circulating amateur photographs and videos of the crash site.
The top item on CCTV website coverage of the crash was headlined, “Compensation of victims' families does not need to be the sooner, the better, what victims' families need is not money” but answers to their questions.
AP Television News footage showed people lighting candles and releasing lanterns during a vigil at a public square in Wenzhou city on Thursday night. Nearly 1,000 people attended the vigil and candles were arranged on the ground to form the words “appeal for truth.”
In a sign of the government's concerns about mounting public anger, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on Thursday held a rare public news conference at the crash site and said a thorough investigation was under way and that those found responsible for the crash would be severely punished. - Sapa-AP