A passenger train from Luxembourg collided head-on with a goods train in north eastern France yesterday, killing around 13 people, state SNCF railways said.

Rail officials said the trains were travelling in opposite directions on the same stretch of track because of maintenance work on an adjoining line.

?It is terrible,? Patrick Hatzig, a vice-president of the Lorraine regional council, told Reuters by telephone from the site of the crash. ?There was a head-on collision. Some people were seriously injured and have been moved (to hospital). Others are still trapped in there.?

The passenger train heading from Luxembourg to the French city of Nancy slammed into the goods train at around 11.45 a.m. (0945 GMT) near the station of Zoufftgen, in the French department of Moselle. SNCF said ?about 10 passengers? died as well as the two drivers of the trains.

A workman was killed by the trackside, a local official said. Yesterday?s crash appeared to be the worst train disaster in France since November 2002 when fire swept through a sleeping car on a Paris-Vienna express train, killing 12 people. French railways said they had opened an inquiry into the collision.

Prime minister Dominique de Villepin was flying to the French Caribbean when news of the accident broke and decided to turn back to France to visit the crash scene.

A spokesman for Luxembourg police said some carriages from the crashed passenger train were still on the Luxembourg side of the border. ?We have been closing streets and roads in the area around the site of the accident. We have also brought in traffic police to take charge of any ambulances if they come into Luxembourg,? said spokesman Vic Reuter.

Aftermath

■ Following is an hour per hour retrospective of all the events which followed the head-on collision between the passenger train and a goods train in the North of Moselle.

From 14:00 pm till 15:00 pm

14:00 pm - Conductor of the French goods train involved in the collision, ?did not exceed a signal in the red? and is normally spent in the green, indicated the executive director of the FNRC.

14:05 pm - Railroad employees, express their ?emotion?, after the announcement of the collision, indicating that ? our thoughts go at first to the victims, the agents FNRC and users, and to their families. Then we shall try to understand the reasons of this disaster.

14:10 pm - The passenger train collided with a goods train in the Moselle is a Luxembourgian regional train, announced the FNRC according to which ? a dozen travelers would have died?, as well as both drivers and person working on ways.

14:15 pm - The french Prime minister Dominique of Villepin went in the afternoon on the scene of the collision.

14:25 pm ? The Minister of Transport Dominique Perben in turn goes on the scene of the collision.

14:45 pm - The collision between the passenger train and a goods train, which occurred to Zoufftgen, would have made at least thirteen deaths and about twenty wounded persons, according to a not yet confirmed balance communicated by fire brigade of Metz.

From 15:00 pm till 15:30 pm

15:20 pm - The regional train bumped on the Luxembourgian border was especially taken by French border workers, according to a spokesman of the Luxembourgian railroads.

15:25 pm - A green number, 0800.130.130, was set up for the families of the victims, announces the FNRC.

15:30 pm - Paris Jacques Chirac calls the government ? to watch the mobilization of all the services of help? after the mortal collision between a passenger train and a goods train to Zoufftgen.