“Those images, the environment, the smell, still haunt me”: Belgium’s biggest traffic disaster commemorated in Nazareth

“The first thing I thought was that I was going to be burned alive.” Exactly 30 years ago, on February 27, 1996, the worst traffic disaster ever occurred in our country. On the E17 near the exit of Nazareth in East Flanders, 10 people died and 56 people were seriously injured in a pile-up involving more than 250 cars. Today, three decades later, relatives, survivors and care providers came together for a moment of remembrance. “We left a victim behind for a moment and saw him make the sign of the cross.”

ttn-3