Andhra Pradesh train crash drivers ‘distracted’ by cricket match

The drivers of a train that crashed in southern India in October, killing 14 people, were distracted watching a cricket match on a phone, India’s railways minister said.

Dozens more were injured when the train missed a signal and collided with another train in Andhra Pradesh state.

Railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said the drivers were watching India play England during the one-day World Cup.

He said new safety measures would be installed to detect such distractions.

Hundreds of millions of cricket fans tuned in to see the live broadcast of the match, which hosts India won.

“Both the loco-pilot and co-pilot were distracted by the cricket match”, Mr Vaishnaw said.

Three carriages of the passenger train, travelling between Visakhapatnam and Palasa, derailed when a second incoming train rammed into it from behind after a signal failure.

Hundreds of ambulances, doctors, nurses and rescue personnel were sent to the scene to rescue passengers and pull out bodies.

A preliminary investigation by the railway authorities immediately after the incident found that the driver and assistant driver of the train were at fault for the collision, the Times of India reports. It adds that an official report by the Commissioners of Railway Safety is yet to be released.

Discussing the safety measures brought in since the incident, railways minister Vaishnaw said they would “make sure that the pilots and the assistant pilots are fully focused on running the train.”

India has one of the world’s largest railway networks, with millions of passengers using it daily. It has seen several disasters over the years.

This was the third major train accident since June last year, when a three-train collision killed as many as 300 people in the eastern state of Odisha.

The worst disaster in India’s recent history was the 1981 derailment in Bihar, which killed nearly 800 people.

Last month, Indian Railways ordered an investigation after a freight train travelled more than 70km (43.4 miles) without a driver.

Footage on social media showed the 53-wagon train from Jammu and Kashmir zooming past several stations at high speed of nearly 100km/h, before arriving in Punjab.

Officials told the PTI news agency: “The train was stopped after a railway official placed wood blocks on the tracks to stop the train.”