A second Russian goods train was impacted by a sudden explosion in the border region of Bryansk on Tuesday, only a day after another freight train was destroyed in what appears to be deliberate attacks. For a second day in a row, a Russian freight train was de-railed after an explosive device went off, forcing the train and several carriages off of the tracks in a part of Russia that borders both Ukraine and Belarus.
In a statement, Bryansk regional governor Alexander Bogomaz confirmed that while there were no casualties, the train itself was seriously damaged.
“An unidentified explosive device went off near the Snezhetskaya railway station,” the Russian official said on Telegram.
“As a result of the incident, a locomotive and several wagons of a freight train de-railed.”
State-owned operator Russian Railways confirmed that the incident, which took place at 7:47pm local time, forced 20 carriages to come off the track. The rail operator did not, however, make any mention of an explosive device, instead blaming the derailment on “unauthorized interference.”
Video footage shared online showed the long train still on the tracks towards the rear, with the front of the train – and the carriages closest to it – left lying on their side at the side of the tracks.
An Explosion on a Rail-Line near the Snezhetskaya Station in the Bryansk Region of Western Russia has caused a Cargo Train to Derail with at least 20 Freight Cars leaving the Tracks; Emergency Services are currently on-site though No Injures have been reported thus far. pic.twitter.com/FCYBYBw9Wc
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) May 2, 2023
On Monday, an explosion also caused a train in Bryansk to become de-railed. The incident, which occurred at 10:17 Moscow time, de-railed seven carriages and caused the train to catch fire.
Governor Bogomaz issued a statement confirming that an unidentified explosive device detonated at the 136km mark on the Bryansk-Unecha railway line. Photographs and video footage shared on social media showed the carriages lay on their side at the side of the track, with huge plumes of smoke and fire seen in the distance.
#Update: just in – Another video footage showing you from another angle that the train was also carrying oil cargo in #bryansk, #Russia, after an explosion caused the train to derail near the border with #Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/pzTGLc1dAZ
— Sotiri Dimpinoudis (@sotiridi) May 1, 2023
Russian forces have also previously targeted Ukrainian railway stations and trains.
In April, 2022, Russia conducted a strike on the busy Kramatorsk railway station in eastern Ukraine. The strike resulted in the deaths of dozens of civilians and has widely been described as a war crime. When the strike occurred, over 500 Ukrainians were present at the railway station, waiting to be evacuated to western Ukraine. At roughly 10:30am, a ballistic missile exploded in the air and released several dozen submunitions that struck the railway facility.
In August 2022, a Russian rocket strike on a railway station in Chaplyne, a town in eastern Ukraine, injured over 30 people and killed 25.
Jack Buckby is 19FortyFive’s Breaking News Editor. He is a British author, counter-extremism researcher, and journalist based in New York. Reporting on the U.K., Europe, and the U.S., he works to analyze and understand left-wing and right-wing radicalization, and reports on Western governments’ approaches to the pressing issues of today. His books and research papers explore these themes and propose pragmatic solutions to our increasingly polarized society.
