BRITISH painter and decorator Andrew Davidson, who witnessed the German rail crash, yesterday described the moment when the express train appeared out of nowhere and ploughed into the car on the line.

He said: ''The train had no chance to stop. There was just an almighty, great crash that seemed to go on for eternity.

''When the dust settled, it was unbelievable. If you could picture a model railway track that had been smashed up by a child, that is probably what it looked like.

''There were carriages on top of each other. Only one carriage came through the other side of the bridge. The bridge had come down on the last three coaches and totally flattened them.''

British soldiers, who were among the first rescuers to arrive at the scene of Germany's worst post-war rail crash, told of the ''utter devastation''.

Colour Sergeant Phil Forsyth, of the 2nd Battalion the Royal Fusiliers, was among those called in from their base at Celle 20 minutes away to help German rescuers with the gruesome task of scouring the wreckage for the dead and injured.

He said: ''It was completely silent. Nobody could have walked away from that. Every casualty was either unconscious or dead.''

The sleek German ICE train lay in splinters underneath a thick cloud of smoke as rescue workers moved between lifeless bodies covered with sheets.

Dozens of passengers had been hurled out of the Munich to Hamburg express but others remained trapped under tons of concrete and twisted metal hours after the crash.

The search for bodies continued through the night although German authorities admitted within five hours of the accident that there was little hope of finding anyone else alive in the two carriages still trapped under the rubble of the overpass.

Several of the rail cars were demolished and shattered glass covered the scene. Luggage was piled next to the wreckage as workers struggled to pry passengers from the train.

More than 1100 rescue workers were at the scene including 10 trauma surgeons and border patrol personnel who helped free passengers trapped inside the rail cars.

Mr Christian Krettek, of University Hospital in Hanover, told reporters that rescue workers expected the death toll to rise and it was still unclear if there were more dead inside the wreckage. A crane was positioned to lift chunks of the bridge to reach cars underneath while helicopters took the critically injured to hospitals all over northern Germany. A Hanover hospital doctor said one of the injured was a pregnant woman who had lost her baby in the accident.

''The victims are lying on the ground. They have been covered up,'' said Mr Juergen Frohns, a spokesman at the scene for German Railways.

''I have to admit that this is affecting me very much,'' he added, trying to fight back tears. ''I couldn't bear to look at all the dead people,'' he added before breaking down and walking away from a group of journalists.

''People were running away from the train,'' said Mrs Kristin Doppenberg, a housewife who was in Eschede minutes after accident. ''Some of the older people who survived the crash were completely shocked but had thought to collect their suitcases.''

Several miles away in Celle, the nearest large town, hundreds of people queued up outside a school that had been hastily converted into a blood donor centre.

Soldiers from a local barracks supervised the crowd while snacks brought in by local businesses were handed out to donors.

''I wanted to help people,'' said 19-year-old student Karl Bugla as he queued. ''I didn't want to just sit and watch the news and do nothing.''