Black armband time

The Weekenders · Post by **The Weekenders** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 1:42 pm

Train death in N Korea. Perhaps 3000 people equal to WTC, but presumably just an accident..

Prayers all around. I can't even imagine this.

Zubivka · Post by **Zubivka** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 1:51 pm

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay. ... tion=world

glauber · Post by **glauber** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 1:55 pm

Yow!

Very similar to what happened recently in Iran. But 3,000 casualties!

g

Wombat · Post by **Wombat** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 1:59 pm

Whatever the numbers, that's shocking.

blackhawk · Post by **blackhawk** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 2:19 pm

Oh man, I just woke up. What a thing to wake up to.

antstastegood · Post by **antstastegood** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 4:14 pm

Terrible thing to happen.

More: http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,3 ... 79,00.html

Cathy Wilde · Post by **Cathy Wilde** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 4:14 pm

What is wrong with this planet????!!!!!

blackhawk · Post by **blackhawk** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 4:31 pm

Cathy Wilde wrote:
What is wrong with this planet????!!!!!

We live in a broken world.

Chuck_Clark · Post by **Chuck_Clark** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 5:13 pm

Cathy Wilde wrote:
What is wrong with this planet????!!!!!

Too many people liviing way too close together and in North Korea's case, anyway, massive overspending on the military (including nuclear) at the expense of even the most basic civilian needs of food, shelter and technology. One cannot even imagine something loke this occurring in most of the world - the safeguards on such volatile transports wouldn't have allowed those trains within miles of one another.

Its a terrible thing, but so is the millions of Koreans who've starved to death in recent years so Kim Il Jong could buy weapons and supplies for his oversized army. And both, ultimately, have to be laid at the feet of a repressive and paranoid regime.

Steven · Post by **Steven** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 7:33 am

Yes, it's a terrible thing, and we'll probably never know the true extent of it. I heard that North Korea has declared such a tight ban on news about this event that they even cut the phone lines coming from the city where it happened.

Steven

pthouron · Post by **pthouron** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 8:11 am

The tight lock they keep on the news over there makes it difficult to really know the extent of the damage. According to NPR's correspondent this morning, the official death toll was at 54, but was expected to skyrocket because it appears over 1,200 residences were destroyed...
1,200 residences, hard to fathom. What were these trains carrying that could cause such extensive destruction?

glauber · Post by **glauber** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 8:28 am

pthouron wrote:1,200 residences, hard to fathom. What were these trains carrying that could cause such extensive destruction?

Gasoline and Liquid Petrol Gas. Very similar thing happened to (fellow axis-of-eviller) Iran in February, where 5 villages were completely destroyed. One of the trains may have been a gift from China. The initial reports were 3,000 casualties, but nobody was saying how many dead or wounded. Now they're saying at least 1,500 wounded 150 confirmed dead but the death toll will rise sharply. This is an old railway (put on by the Japanese during WWII) and very accident-prone, they say.

Montana · Post by **Montana** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 8:40 am

Oh good, glauber, maybe you can clear this up.
I caught just a quick headline on NPR about this this morning and I also caught something about them trying to couple a car loaded with dynamite to a car with gasoline?!

The inevitable "What?!" came out of my mouth but they didn't hear me so they didn't repeat it...

Seth · Post by **Seth** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 8:53 am

No one really knows for certain what was on either train. At least one had gasoline or petrolium tanker cars, but one may have actually been a passenger train. Lots of theories flying around right now. It's hard to tell since the North Korean government has stopped service to most international phone lines, so no one can call outside the country.

Seth

Tres · Post by **Tres** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 8:58 am

Now some people are estimating 200 casualties, not 3,000.

????

Tres