Roundup: 10 people killed in German train collision

A total of 10 people were killed in a train collision happened Tuesday in Bad Aibling in the southern German state of Bavaria, local police announced on Wednesday.

All 10 victims, with nine men, come from the Bavarian city of Rosenheim and Traunstein, between 24 and 59 years old. Local police reported that the identity of one victim has not been confirmed yet.

Meanwhile, local police said in a statement that authorities are still investigating the cause of the horrible incident and they are not to give statements at present.

Investigators are trying to determine why an automatic safety system designed to avoid head-on collisions failed to prevent the incident, allowing two trains to collide at full speed on a single-track line.

"We are at the very beginning of the investigation. It will take weeks or months before we can give information to the cause of the accident," a spokesman of local police said.

According to previous reports of some German media, the collision was caused by "human error," which has not yet been confirmed.

German Transport Minister Alexander Dobrindt said Wednesday that information from the first of three black boxes from the trains shows no indication of a technical failure, and that the remaining two black boxes have to be examined in order to find the cause.

However, the third black box has been found on the scene, according to Dobrindt.

In addition, major political parties have called off their traditional beer-fueled Ash Wednesday rallies out of respect for victims, saying that it would be inappropriate to go forward with the political activities this year in light of the train crash, killing 10 and injuring 81 people.

Instead, some politicians including Bavarian minister president Horst Seehofer paid a visit to the collision scene on Wednesday, expressing their sorrows and asking people to stop speculating the cause and to wait for further results of investigation. Endit