Truck hits train on the way to Phan Thiet

Yesterday, bleary-eyed, I jumped aboard the 6.40AM train from Saigon to Mui Ne. At around 200kms, Mui Ne is the closest major beach resort town to Saigon (I don’t count Vung Tau). We were just 30 minutes outside Phan Thiet, the nearest rail stop to Mui Ne, when our train shook and a scraping sound whizzed past us, towards the back carriages. It turned out that a truck had crashed into the train - not the other way around. Somehow, it connected with the third carriage and became wedged in. The truck driver must have fallen asleep or somehow lost control of his vehicle. It’s difficult to explain how it could have happened. Sadly, the truck driver was killed. The train wasn’t seriously damaged - all the impacted carriages had been torn open as the train passed the wedged-in truck. The only double-decker carriage had all its windows smashed. Miraculously, I was told that none of the passengers in that cabin were injured. Our cabins were locked. We couldn’t get out. Thank God we didn’t need to. I assumed we’d be stuck for many hours. But we were only delayed for about 30 minutes - and then we pulled away as if nothing had happened. It could have been far more serious. This morning, another truck collided with a train just outside of Hanoi. This time the train was derailed. Rail has always seemed a far safer option to travelling distances on Vietnam’s deadly roads. Passenger casualties on trains are thankfully still very rare. But rail may not be as safe as I thought.