Manoj Baliyan was enjoying the cool evening breeze sitting on the porch of his house on Saturday evening when he heard a massive thud. The next thing he saw was a blue railway coach flying over another coach and hit his house like a giant projectile. When he gathered his wits all he could see was scores of bodies in front of the house, along the railway track.
"A coach had even rammed the boundary wall of a college building near our house," said Baliyan, who runs a shop in the area.
The railway accident in Khatauli area of the district brought tragedy for not only the passengers of the Utkal Express, but also for locals whose houses lined the tracks, and are now splattered with blood.
Also Read: Utkal Express derailment: 23 dead, 90 injured in accident; initial probe indicates human error
The accident occurred around 5.45 pm Saturday near Khatauli town in this district and left 23 people dead and over 60 injured, the Uttar Pradesh Police said.
Khatauli is around 40 km from Muzaffarnagar.
Baliyan (42) and his family are still shaken as one end of the mangled sleeper coach (S2) of the train, which had rammed his house's porch, shattering its facade, is leaning precariously on the house.
"There was a massive thud and one of the coaches flew over the pantry car and rammed our house's porch," he told PTI.
The other end of the S2 coach is resting over the pantry coach with its doors shattered.
Also Read: Utkal Express derailment: Train driver was not informed of 'unofficial' maintenance of track
NDRF personnel, pressed into service for search and rescue operations, were seen pulling out bodies from the mangled coach that had rammed the boundary wall of Choudhary Tilak Ram Inter College.
"We pulled out the body of a woman from underneath the coach. We have noticed a limb in the debris and efforts are on to pull out the body," an NDRF personnel said.
The woman was not a passenger on the train but was sitting on tea stall across railway track when the accident took place.
A sense of fear pervaded the site's atmosphere, while for the passengers of the train and the locals the night has turned into a nightmare. The shaken locals and villagers, however, were seen helping out those engaged in the rescue work.
(With PTI inputs)
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