It is reported that at least four people have been killed and 15 others seriously injured after a train derailed in southern Germany this afternoon.
The train was heading to Munich with many students onboard, when three carriages came off the tracks near Garmisch-Partenkirchen.
The accident happened at around 13:15 local time (11:15 GMT) on Friday, just after the train left Garmisch-Partenkirchen for Munich.
”The number of fatally injured in the train accident unfortunately increases to four people,” Upper Bavaria South Police, which have taken over rescue efforts, said Friday afternoon.
According to the Police said an approximately 30 injured passengers, and 15 have sustained serious injuries and were admitted to hospitals in the surrounding area.
Photos and videos from the scene circulating on social media show carriages of a double-decker regional train rolled down an embankment and caught in leafy trees, as rescue workers carried people away on stretchers.
The accident happened on the last day of school before the Pentecost during the weekend, a religious holiday celebrated in Bavaria. It was not immediately clear how many students were on board when the train came off the tracks.
Germany’s transport minister, Volker Wissing, spoke of the accident, the full extent of which he said was yet to be understood. “The pictures that are reaching us at the moment from Garmisch-Partenkirche are dramatic,” said the politician, of the liberal Free Democratic party (FDP).
“It was just terrible,” an American soldier who witnessed the accident from a nearby road told Garmisch-Partenkirchener Tagblatt newspaper. “Just terrible, the train suddenly tipped over.”