Bodies recovered from train crash in Greece handed over

LARISA, Greece (AP) — A review of all human remains recovered so far from the site of the deadliest train crash in Greek history indicates that the number of people killed in this week’s train disaster remains of 57, authorities said on Friday.

Recovery teams spent a third day examining the wreckage in Tempe, 380 kilometers north of Athens, where a passenger train crashed head-on into a freight train shortly before midnight on Tuesday.

The force of the accident and the resulting fire made it difficult to determine the death toll. Authorities are comparing parts of dismembered and burned corpses with tissue samples to establish the figure.

The remains were returned to the families in closed caskets after the victims were identified through DNA samples from the next of kin.

Relatives of the passengers still missing were waiting for news outside a hospital in Larissa, central Greece. Among them was Mirella Ruci, whose son Denis, 22, was still missing.

“My son is not on any official list at this time and I have no information. I urge anyone who has seen him, in car 5, seat 22, to contact me if they have seen him” , Ruci told reporters.

Officials from the Ministry of Health have indicated that the identification of the victims will be carried out by DNA cross-testing of relatives due to the condition of many of the corpses.

Police and civilian forensic specialists have set up teams to carry out the complex round-the-clock body identification process, which consists of two steps: assembling the corresponding body parts of each victim, then establishing their identity using DNA samples from relatives of the missing passengers.

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Gatopoulos brought from Athens. Associated Press writers Costas Kantouris in Thessaloniki, Greece, and Menelaos Hadjicostis contributed to this report.