At least 58 people killed as holiday train is derailed

AN EXPRESS train crowded with holiday travellers derailed in southern Pakistan yesterday, killing at least 58 people and leaving hundreds of terrified survivors to claw their way out of the wreckage in total darkness.

The train was loaded with an estimated 900 passengers, many of them heading home for the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha.

Dozens of soldiers and police helped tend the injured and carry them away to waiting ambulances, as hundreds of people from the surrounding villages looked on. Army engineers used two cranes and cutting equipment to free the last survivors.