Paris train crash kills seven people and injures dozens A derailed wagon lies on its side at the crash site in Brétigny-sur-Orge station near Paris. At least seven people have died and dozens injured when a packed French intercity train derailed and crashed at high speed into a station outside Paris. The French railways SNCF said the train travelling from Paris to Limoges was carrying about 370 passengers when it derailed at 5.15pm on Friday at Brétigny-sur-Orge in Essonne, 20km south of Paris. Four of the train's seven carriages ploughed into a crowded platform at rush hour on one of the busiest days of the year for holiday getaways. Security services were working on the wreckage where passengers were believed to be trapped in mangled carriages, which were lying on their side. The interior minister, Manuel Valls, said at least seven were killed and dozens were injured, some seriously, but he warned that toll was likely to rise. Michael Lesaunier, the owner of a cafe beside the busy suburban station told iTele: "The train approached very very fast, knocking out everything in its path. It was rush hour, the platform was full. He added that the passengers he had seen were very shocked and talking of serious injuries. Boris Berson, a passenger travelling in one of the front carriages which did not derail, said the passengers in his unaffected carriage were shaken and "did not know what was going on." El Mehdi Bazgua, 19, who saw the derailment from the window of a different RERC local suburban train told Le Parisien website: "I heard a massive noise and saw a cloud of sand that covered everything. I saw stones and wires on the ground. Then the dust lifted ... We saw the first injured. I saw a man with an open head wound. Lots of people were cut. Lots of train passengers were blocked under the train. He had heard of very bad injuries and said a lot of passengers on his train were crying. One of the wounded passengers complained to observers not to film the scene of the accident. Several witnesses described the train that derailed as appearing to "split in two." One witness told Europe 1 radio of a scene of chaos and panic at the station where he said the derailed carriages were "literally crushed." The Socialist mayor of Bretigny, Bernard Decaux told Le Parisien: "Three carriages were tangled up one behind the other" with a fourth lying on its side. He added: "I have no idea of the number of casualties, I've just been told it risks being very heavy. There are people injured by ballast. He said "Everyone was running in all directions. It was panic. It was an apocalyptic sight. At the scene, Guillaume Pepy, head of the SNCF French railways, in tears in front of French TV cameras, talked of a "rail catastrophe." Hospitals in Paris were on emergency alert to treat serious injuries, including from electrocution. As hundreds of emergency staff worked on the wreckage, the circumstances of the derailment were not yet fully clear. The train had left the Paris-Austerlitz station on time and was scheduled, as usual, to pass through the suburban Bretigny station at high speed without stopping on its way to the city of Limoges in west central France. But carriages three and four of the train derailed and careered into the train platform, dragging other carriages behind them.