Six coaches of the Jaffar Express derailed and four people were injured on Sunday in Mastung district of Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province due to an explosive device planted on the track. Officials gave this information. Officials said that the train was going towards Peshawar. However, officials said that no one was injured. This blast has happened in the series of many attacks targeting the Jaffar Express.
A Pakistan Railway official said that the explosion took place in the train near the Spazand railway station, about 25 kilometers from Quetta. He said that this explosion took place shortly after the train left the city at nine in the morning with 350 passengers. Muhammad Kashif, Public Relations Officer of Quetta Division of Pakistan Railways, told the media, “A bomb planted on the railway track exploded strongly, due to which six coaches of the train going from Quetta to Peshawar derailed. Fortunately no one lost their lives.”
The official said that all the injured passengers have suffered minor injuries. Rescue teams, including railway employees, were rushed to the spot and an accident relief train was dispatched to ferry the stranded passengers to Quetta. Security forces and police have cordoned off the area while bomb disposal squads have been deployed to clear the tracks, officials said. Meanwhile, in a separate statement, Kashif said services of Jaffar Express and Bolan Mail have been suspended till August 14.
He said Bolan Mail will resume its operations on August 16 (Saturday). The Jaffar Express, which runs between Quetta and Peshawar, has been repeatedly targeted in recent months. On August 7, the train had a narrow escape near Sibi railway station in Balochistan where a bomb placed near the track exploded soon after the passenger train passed by.
In another incident on August 4, gunmen fired five bullets at its pilot engine near Kolpur. The separatist Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility for the attack. In June, a remote-controlled explosive device planted on the railway tracks exploded, derailing four coaches of the Jaffar Express in Jacobabad.