A train hit and killed four workers in Japan on Thursday, authorities said, a rare incident in a country renowned for its normally excellent rail safety record.
Local media reported that the four workers were removing weeds from the train tracks at Shin-Kanuma Station in Kanuma city north of Tokyo when the express train struck them.
"The four were confirmed dead," a fire department official told AFP.
Another official said that when emergency services arrived, three workers were trapped under the train, while one was on the platform.
The workers, all men, were in their 50s and 60s, Jiji Press reported. None of the roughly 50 passengers on the train suffered injuries.
The six-car train was the Spacia X express on the Tobu Nikko Line, connecting Greater Tokyo with popular tourist destination Nikko in the Tochigi region, media reports said.
The Tokyo-bound train was approaching its stop at Shin-Kanuma when the accident occurred, broadcaster NHK said, citing the operator.
"We heard this loud rumbling noise. Then the train came to an emergency stop with such sudden braking that it was impossible to stand," a 40-year-old man who was on the train told NHK.
"There was an announcement saying 'we will stop to identify where the noise came from', and then we were left unable to get off for a while," the man was quoted as saying.
Local media reported that the workers were part of a seven-person crew removing weeds from around the train tracks.
Japanese railways have one of the best safety records in the world.
Fatal accidents from malfunctioning trains are extremely rare in Japan due to high levels of maintenance and training, and use of advanced technology.
Japan's deadliest accident this century was in April 2005 when a rush-hour commuter train derailed and smashed into an apartment building in Amagasaki, in the country's west, killing 107 people and injured more than 500 others.
An accident involving a derailed cargo train and two passenger trains killed 161 people in 1963.
There has never been a passenger fatality from a derailment or a collision on Japan's network of "shinkansen" bullet trains since they entered service in 1964.
