The Gaisal train disaster occurred on 2 August 1999, when two trains carrying 2,500 people collided at the remote station of Gaisal, 310 miles from the city of Gauhati in Assam. The crash was at such high speeds that the trains actually exploded upon impact killing at least 285 people.
The crash occurred at about 1.30am on 2 August, when the Awadh Assam Express from New Delhi was stationary at the station. The Brahmaputra Mail from Dibrugarh, packed with soldiers and security police heading for the border regions at very high speed, through a signalling error, was transferred onto the same track as the express train. Nobody noticed the error on either train, or in the signals office, until the Brahmaputra Mail train crashed headlong into the front of the Awadh Assam Express. The engine of the Awadh Assam was thrown high in the air, and passengers from both trains were blown into neighbouring buildings and fields by the force of the explosion.
The line was blocked by wreckage, and the Gaisal emergency services were utterly overwhelmed, as fire swept through the ruined vehicles and station buildings, killing many of the injured people trapped in the trains. Many vehicles and aid support services had to undertake the 14 hour drive from Calcutta to reach the site, by which time many of those they could have helped were already dead. Those who were picked up by rescuers were taken to hospitals in Kishanganj and Islampur, which were also overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster.
Heavy rains helped dampen fires the following day, and rescue workers began trying to separate the twelve mangled carriages of the train and identify the bodies contained inside. Many were unrecognizable and never identified.
The official death toll released was set at 285 killed and over 300 injured in the crash. Unofficial totals have claimed that over 300, 400 or even 500 were killed, including 90 soldiers, but because of the nature of the crash and fire, as well as the large number of ticketless people who may have been on the trains, these bodies could not be separately identified. There has also been speculation that explosives carried on the military train may have been the cause of the explosion following the impact, rather than the trains themselves. This has been denied by the Indian military, but has remained a controversial issue.
This was the worst Indian rail disaster since the Firozabad rail disaster in 1995, and is comparable to the Bihar train disaster of 1981, in which as many as 800 people were reported to have died.
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