A train and a taxi collided at a level crossing near the north-western Bulgarian town of Berkovitsa on December 26 2008. Three people in the car were injured.

Bulgarian news agency Focus quoted the National Medical Co-ordination Centre as saying that three people were injured and had been admitted to hospital in Berkovitsa.
 
The Interior Ministry said that four people were injured, two of them severely, in road accidents overnight from December 25 to 26. 

There were 103 minor road accidents in Sofia on the night of Christmas Day, the ministry said.

Meanwhile, hospital staff have expressed concern about the annual rash of firework-related injuries. On December 25, a 24-year-old woman was treated at Sofia's Pirogov emergency hospital after being injured in the face by a ricocheting firework when she went out on to her apartment balcony. She was discharged after treatment, the hospital said.

Television station bTV quoted hospital staff as warning that New Year inevitably brought a number of firework-related injuries. Sofia and other Bulgarian cities and towns customarily see a cannonade of fireworks as midnight brings a new year.

"Doctors who have been on duty on December 31 - January 1 say that five minutes after midnight, it becomes scary," bTV said.

The station said that online, youths had posted videos of themselves demonstrating dangerous practices with fireworks, including setting off large numbers of fireworks simultaneously.