France Train Derailment Injures 44; Sabotage Probe Underway

French authorities are investigating whether sabotage caused a train derailment in Normandy that left 44 people injured, after a piece of rail was discovered on the track, police said on Saturday.

The regional train was travelling from Rouen to Caen with 186 passengers on board when it derailed on Friday evening at Cléon, in the Seine-Maritime department of northwestern France.

Among the injured was an 18-year-old woman who was evacuated by helicopter to Rouen University Hospital, police said.

A spokeswoman for the French national police communications service, known as SICOP, said the piece of rail found on the track was "probably" linked to the derailment. She spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorised to be publicly named under police policy.

Investigators are working to determine whether the circumstances were accidental or involved sabotage, the service said. The prosecutor's office has remained cautious about drawing conclusions, according to police.

The incident recalls previous rail disasters in France. In July 2013, a derailment at Brétigny-sur-Orge, south of Paris, killed seven people. In November 2015, a high-speed TGV train undergoing tests derailed at Eckwersheim, near Strasbourg, killing 11.

More recently, a crash involving two high-speed trains at Adamuz in southern Spain killed 46 people and injured more than 100 in January, according to the Andalusian regional government.