Russia: Death Train | European Journal

For the past year, Moscow and St. Petersburg have been connected by a high-speed railway service. But tracks and level crossings were not modernized, and there have been several fatal accidents as a Sapsan, or peregrine falcon as English would have it, is Russia’s pride and joy. A variation on Germany’s high-speed ICE train, it travels at 250 kilometers per hour. But the route takes the speedsters through the underdeveloped Russian provinces, where they tear through villages with sometimes fatal