MOSCOW, May 20 (RIA Novosti) – Victims of a train accident on Tuesday in the Moscow region and their families will receive up to $60,000 in compensation, the head of Russia’s National Union of Liability Insurers (NSSE) Andrey Yuriev said Tuesday.
Two trains collided in the Moscow region earlier on Tuesday, leaving up to 5 dead and around 25 injured, including one child, according to emergency officials. The accident happened at the railroad line between Naro-Fominsk and Bekasovo, when a freight train derailed and collided into a long-distance passenger train going from Moscow to Chisinau.
According to the preliminary information from the Moscow Transport Department, the collision was caused by a broken rail.
“Sixteen carriages of a freight train 1484 went off tracks due to a broken rail at the Kiev railway Bekasovo-1 — Nara. The coming-off tracks resulted in a sideways collision with a passenger train Moscow-Chisinau, with the 7th and 8th carriages getting crashed," an official told the regional web portal V Podmoskovye, adding that it led to a sideways collision with a passenger train.
According to NSSE’s Andrey Yuriev, the injured and their families may receive compensations from the insurance company with which the transport operator had signed a contract on obligatory liability insurance under a law which came into force last year.
Nine emergency teams and several medical helicopters, along with 250 responders, were sent to help the injured at the accident site. The train service was cut off at platforms 1 and 2. Additional buses will carry some passengers from the accident scene.
