Survivors recount pre-dawn nightmare

ZIBO, Shandong: For judoka Zhang Lin, death was just inches away - literally - when the train crash occurred early yesterday morning.

Returning to Qingdao after a training camp in Beijing, she was fast asleep when a violent jolt woke her up.

She immediately felt something was wrong, and instinctively cradled her head with both arms. A second later, she felt a force so strong that she felt herself swung from her sleeper berth and thrown out of the train window.