Emergency aid began arriving at the site of North Korea's devastating train explosion today as the death toll rose to more than 160, nearly half of them children in a school torn apart by the blast. At least 1,300 people were injured.
The Red Cross said the explosion destroyed the railway station in Ryongchon, near the Chinese border, and turned the surrounding area into a landscape of huge craters, twisted rail tracks and scorched buildings. Thousands were left homeless.
"They've been taken in by other families. We were fearing people on the streets," John Sparrow, a Red Cross spokesman in Beijing, said today. "We breathed a big sigh of relief when we saw that wasn't the case."
North Korea blamed the disaster on human error, saying a train cargo of oil and chemicals ignited when workers knocked the wagons against power lines.
The statement was unusual for normally secretive country, as was its plea earlier in the week for international help. Foreign aid workers were allowed to visit the scene Saturday, but only after all of the dead and injured had been evacuated.
North Korea's official death toll rose from 154 to 161, the Red Cross said. It was unclear whether the higher number was due to the deaths of some of the 1,300 injured, also an official figure.
North Korean state television announced that Chinese supplies were headed for Ryongchon, indicating the totalitarian government had notified its population of the catastrophe.