Sabotage suspected: Cables cut on a major railway line in Germany
Police do not rule out that the attack may have been politically motivated (Photo: Getty Images)
Train traffic on the Cologne–Düsseldorf railway line in Germany has been paralyzed due to sabotage, with all cables cut in a cable pit, Welt reports.
Train traffic on the railway line between Cologne and Düsseldorf has been disrupted due to damage to railway cables, with police describing the incident as an act of sabotage. According to law enforcement, a politically motivated attack on critical infrastructure cannot be ruled out. The federal security service has joined the investigation.
Reports indicate that overnight, unknown individuals opened an underground cable pit and cut all the cables using a cutting disc. This caused the signaling station in Leverkusen to go offline and created problems on the main railway line along the Rhine.
Cable damage was recorded at least in two locations along the line near Leverkusen. Initially, the police considered the incident an act of vandalism, but they have since changed their assessment.
Train services in this section have been rerouted or replaced by buses, resulting in significantly longer travel times for passengers. Long-distance traffic from the Ruhr region has been diverted via Wuppertal, while regional services on the left bank of the Rhine have been rerouted through Neuss.
Disruption of the overhead contact line has also caused major restrictions on rail traffic in the north. Trains between Hamburg and Berlin have been canceled. Services between Hamburg and Hannover have been rerouted, with delays of up to 50 minutes, and some connections have been canceled entirely.
Since July, Russia has launched a wave of massive attacks on Ukraine’s railway infrastructure, attempting to destroy key junction stations.
