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Ukraine: Village evacuated after ammonia leaks from derailed train Source: BBC Monitoring Former Soviet Union - Political Publication date: 2000-05-21

Text of report by Ukrainian television on 21st May [Presenter Tetyana Kravchenko] Yesterday evening, a railway accident took place near the village of Kostyantynivka, Smila District, Cherkasy Region. Here is our correspondent, Oksana Sokolova, speaking by phone.

[Correspondent] Yesterday at around 1900 [1600 gmt], all the rescue services in Cherkasy Region received a report about the derailment of five wagons of a cargo train belonging to the Znamyanka locomotive depot. Immediately, 10 fire engines, 75 policemen and civil-defence rescue teams were dispatched to the scene. No casualties were reported, but ammonia mixture leaked from two cisterns - around 100 tonnes in all. This presented a danger to the lives of the inhabitants of nearby Kostyantynivka; 160 of them have already been evacuated. The rescue works are continuing. The accident was most probably due to the rails damaged by the rain shower yesterday. We will report more details later.

http://realcities.yellowbrix.com/pages/realcities/Story.nsp?story_id=10724176&site=charlotte&ID=realcities&scategory=Transportation

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