Taiwan crash

The Chinese mainland mourned victims of Taiwan’s train derailment on Sunday, as the State Council’s Taiwan Affairs Office and the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits expressed their heartfelt condolences to the families of the injured and dead.

As of Monday morning, the toll from the Sunday derailment stood at 18 dead and 190 injured, including a US national, local media reported.

Taiwan health department announced that two people from the mainland were among those injured.

The Puyuma Express No. 6432 bound for Taitung from Shulin Station with 366 passengers on board derailed at 4:50 pm at Xinma Station, Yilan county.

According to media reports, all eight carriages of the train were derailed, and five of them toppled over. Affected passengers were sent to hospitals nearby in police cars and ambulances.

Taiwan’s transportation authorities said that the derailed train operated for six years was overhauled not long ago. A driver said an unidentified object was suspected to have caused the derailment, local media reported.

The cause of the deadly derailment is still under investigation.

The Puyuma train was imported from Japan, and started operation in February 2013 with a maximum speed of 150 kilometers per hour.

Another Puyuma train derailed last year with no casualties.

It is unknown whether passengers were trapped under the carriage until the carriage is lifted by a crane, said the transportation authority.

The mainland has paid close attention to the accident, said officials from the mainland authorities.

Photo: AFP A damaged car of the Puyuma Express is lifted by crane in Yilan, eastern Taiwan, on Monday. Taiwan authorities pushed for a swift investigation after an express train derailed on a coastal tourist route, killing at least 18 people in the island’s worst rail accident for a quarter of the century