WARSAW: Three wild European bison died on Sunday morning after being hit by a train in Poland’s vast UNESCO-listed Bialowieza Forest in the east, the local police said.
According to a police spokesman, a herd of Europe’s largest mammals, whose male specimens can reach 900 kilograms (nearly 2,000 pounds), crossed onto the train tracks as a locomotive carrying some 50 passengers between Bialystok and Warsaw was steaming ahead.
“No passenger was injured but three animals perished in this accident, which happened at 7:00 am, near the village of Witowo,” spokesman Konrad Karwacki said.
The “Zubr” line train, which takes its name from the Polish word for bison, did not derail and was able to resume its journey around an hour and a half after the collision.
Some 1,200 bison, an emblematic animal in the eastern European country, currently inhabit the Polish part of the great Bialowieza Forest, considered the last primeval woodland in Europe.
