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Two people have died and 27 are injured after a high-speed passenger train derailed and slammed into the side of a building in northern Italy.
The state-railway Freccia Rossa train came off the rail around 5.30am local time in the countryside outside the northern town of Lodi while travelling from Milan to the southern city of Salerno.
It is believed the state-railway Freccia Rossa train was travelling at about 180mph when the incident took place.
A train engineer and another rail worker died, while a third person, said to be a cleaner on the train, sustained significant but non life-threatening injuries.
Two people died in the pre-dawn crashAPA video of the scene showed the front engine and at least one passenger wagon had skipped the tracks, flipping onto its side. Photographs suggested the engine had broken clear of the rest of the train and smashed into an adjacent building.
"The engine car derailed, detached completely and kept going," Girolamo Fabiano, a railroad police official told state radio. "Then the second car derailed."
Due to the early morning time of the train, there was only 30 passengers in all on board, police said.
The two front cars completely derailedREUTERSCivil Protection chief Angelo Borrelli said two of the injured were in serious condition, while the other 25 were less seriously injured.
Rescuers had to help some passengers out of the train.
One of the wheels from the wreckageAFP via Getty ImagesMr Fabiano said that work had been done on that stretch of line during the night, but it was unclear if that was a factor in the crash.
Mr Borrelli said the high-speed state railways train had departed from Milan at 5.10am (4.10am GMT) and was headed south to Bologna when it derailed.
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Rail traffic was diverted to local tracks, with delays of about an hour reported.