At least four people were killed and 26 others were injured when a passenger and freight train collided head-on around midnight Wednesday into Thursday in Pardubice, a city of more than 90,000 in the central part of the Czech Republic, emergency services and local authorities said. .

“Four passengers suffered fatal injuries,” Alena Kisiala, a spokeswoman for emergency services, told public television.

The district governor in Pardubice, Martin Netolitski, spoke via Facebook about 4 dead and 26 injured.

According to the fire department, some of the injured are in serious condition.

According to information broadcast by the Czech public television network CT24, the accident happened shortly before midnight (Greek time) near Pardubice railway station, which is about a hundred kilometers from Prague and is a railway hub.

Some 300 passengers, including many foreigners, were on the train, according to state television, which broadcast footage showing a derailed carriage and survivors boarding buses near Pardubice’s central railway station.

The passenger train, owned by the private company RegioJet, was traveling from the Czech capital Prague to the Ukrainian city of Chop, which neighbors Slovakia.

Based on the official schedule, it departed from Prague at 22:52 and was scheduled to depart from Pardubice at 23:47 (Greece time). It was supposed to arrive in Chop at around 11:35 today (Greece time), since it would cross part of Slovakian territory from west to east.

The freight train was carrying calcium carbonate, Ventula Horakova, a spokeswoman for the Czech fire brigade, told public television. It is an industrial product used to produce acetylene.

The interior and transport ministers rushed to the scene of the accident, while Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala expressed his condolences to the families of the dead via X.