Kathmandu, April 3. At least 50 people were killed, and 146 others injured in Taiwan on Friday after a train carrying many holiday home-returning passengers derailed in the island’s deadliest accident in over four decades.

Local transportation authorities reported that the driver and the assistant driver of the train were among the dead. The 48 others were all passengers.

By 7 p.m. nobody remained trapped inside the train, the authorities said, but rescuers told media earlier in the day that they had to work overnight to comb through the wreckage as some train cars were severely damaged.

The accident occurred in a tunnel in eastern Taiwan’s Hualien County at 9:28 a.m. Friday, the start of the four-day Tomb-sweeping Day holiday. Many passengers on board were heading home to tend to family graves.

The local police suspect that a wrongly parked construction vehicle fell from above the tunnel and hit the passing train, causing the accident.

The person responsible for the accident is being interrogated.

Ma Xiaoguang, a spokesperson for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, expressed condolences over the accident. “The mainland is deeply concerned about the rescue progress.”

The Central Committee of the Taiwan Democratic Self-Government League has also released a letter of sympathy, sending condolences to the affected families and well wishes to the injured.

“People on both sides of the Taiwan Strait share a natural affinity. The compatriots on the mainland feel for the pain of loss of Taiwan compatriots,” the letter read. (Xinhua)