Traffickers Hijack Rio Passenger Train, Force Unscheduled Stop at Overpass

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – A train from the Gramacho/Saracuruna station was hijacked at rush hour on Monday, September 16th, by men armed with rifles in the Northside of Rio de Janeiro.

The information was released exclusively by the column of Ancelmo Gois, GLOBO, this Tuesday, September 16th.

According to the Brazilian train operator SuperVia Trens Urbanos, six criminals traveled for about three kilometers (1.8 miles) in the engine driver’s cabin until they made a stop near the Mangueira overpass, in an unscheduled stop. During the trip, the six men did not attack the passengers.

Armed with rifles, the criminals invaded the engine driver’s cabin, on Monday morning, at Manguinhos station. At that time, the train was traveling southbound to the station “Central do Brasil” in the city center of Rio.

After the departure, the criminals remained next to the driver, at the mandatory stop at Triagem station, which is right after Manguinhos.

Without noticing what was happening, passengers disembarked normally at the station, while the rest of the users of the route continued traveling.

In the stretch between Triagem and Maracanã station, the criminals forced the engine driver to stop the train at the Mangueira overpass, where they disembarked.

Soon after the traffickers escaped, the concessionaire was warned of what had happened and triggered the Railway Police division of the state police (GPFer), who went to the scene, but no one was arrested.

The highjacking occurred on the same day that a state police operation caused the interruption of railway traffic for more than an hour in another branch.

At the time, due to a shooting in Jacarezinho, the Belford Roxo branch had its traffic interrupted between 5:35 am and 6:45 am.

On Tuesday, September 17th, users of the Belford Roxo branch again suffered with partial interruption of train traffic in the Jacarezinho stretch, because of another shooting
between traffickers and police.

Because of this, for more than two hours, the circulation of trains occurred only between the stations Belford Roxo and Del Castilho. The departures from Central Station
to Belford Roxo were interrupted in the same period.

At 9:22 am the circulation, which had been paralyzed at 6:30am, began to be made again only by a line of the branch, in the stretch between Triagem and Cavalcanti,
because of damage to the communication network of the railway network.

At 11:45 am, railroad traffic on the Belford Roxo branch was fully normalized, according to SuperVia.

According to the concessionaire, in the year 2019, SuperVia already needed to change the circulation of trains 58 times, in the eight branches operated by the company, because of gunfire exchanges in the vicinity of the railroad.