Just before 11:30 A.M. on a warm spring day in late March (26th), train service 89 travelling from Luxor to Alexandria came to a standstill outside the town of Tahta, in the Sohag governorate in Upper Egypt. It was an unexplained stop, but one familiar to regular users of Egypt’s national rail system. The crowded train sat for fifteen minutes in the heat. Then at 11:42 A.M. another train, service 2011, collided at speed into its back. Seventy-two ambulances were sent; 19 people ultimately died and 165 were injured. An investigation was announced, and the story made headlines across the world. On Twitter, President El Sisi wrote “The pain in our hearts today will only increase our determination to put an end to this type of disaster.” https://twitter.com/AlsisiOfficial/status/1375428076100853761 Three weeks later, train 949 travelling from Cairo to Mansoura, derailed outside of Toukh, twenty miles north of Cairo, killing 23 people and injuring almost 140. The Egyptian Railway Network has been hampered by safety concerns for some years now. Since 2000, over 700 people have died in train crashes in Egypt, more than 380 of them in 2002, when a sleeper…
