Train services between Jette and Denderleeuw are suspended until Monday morning, after an Infrabel maintenance train derailed near Ternat on Wednesday. SNCB-NMBS are operating replacement buses for the route.
On Wednesday afternoon, three wagons of a maintenance train derailed after it struck the last carriage of a passenger train while entering the station near Essene-Lombeek.
None of the roughly 70 passengers were on board the passenger train were injured. Train services on the line were suspended immediately after the incident, and Infrabel said on Thursday that the track will remain out of use until Monday morning.
Infrabel aims to remove the derailed maintenance train by Friday evening and said repair works to the infrastructure will continue day and night.
The derailment caused heavy damage to rail infrastructure, particularly near Ternat station, according to Infrabel spokesperson Thomas Baeken, who said many sleepers and part of the signalling system will need to be replaced over a stretch of several hundred metres.
According to the initial findings of the investigation, a component underneath one of the maintenance train’s wagons came loose. The part later broke off and ended up under the wheels, causing that wagon to derail and pulling two others off the track.
