NEW DELHI — As India’s premier Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe prepare to break ground on the country’s first bullet train project Thursday, experts say the collaboration could signal a massive leap for its overburdened and deadly railways.

India’s colonial-era rail network carries some 22 million passengers daily, making it one of the busiest in the world. But it is also among the most dangerous.

A government report published in 2012 said almost 15,000 people were killed every year in rail accidents, describing the deaths as an annual “massacre” due mainly to poor safety standards.

Mr. Modi has pledged to invest billions of dollars to modernize the country’s crumbling railway infrastructure, which is plagued by delays, and the bullet train was one of his key election promises ahead of a landslide victory in 2014.

As New Delhi and Tokyo seek to forge closer ties to combat China’s growing regional influence, the project offers a diplomatic and economic boost.

The premiers will lay the foundation for the bullet train network in the western city of Ahmedabad — connecting Mr. Modi’s home state of Gujarat with India’s financial capital Mumbai.

Japan is a pioneer in high-speed rail transport — with its Shinkansen bullet train ranked among the fastest in the world.

With projected top speeds of up to 350 kilometers (217 miles) an hour — more than double the maximum speed offered by the fastest trains operating in India — it will reduce travel time between the two cities from eight hours to at most three-and-a-half hours.

The new train, which will have a capacity of 750 passengers, is also expected to be safer than the country’s creaking rail network, the world’s fourth largest by distance.

Mr. Modi recently replaced his railway minister after a series of derailments, including one last month in which at least 23 people were killed in northern Uttar Pradesh state. Nearly 150 died in a similar accident in November.

The agreement for the 508-kilometer network was signed in 2016, with plans to make it operational by December 2023.

Nearly 85% of the total project, which costs $19 billion, will be provided by Tokyo in soft loans, with repayment over 50 years.

‘BALANCE CHINA’S HEGEMONY’
Mr. Abe’s visit to Ahmedabad comes ahead of Mr. Modi’s 67^th birthday on Sunday and many have dubbed it as part of his practice of “birthday diplomacy.”

The right-wing Hindu nationalist leader hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping in Gujarat on his birthday in 2014.

“India’s relation with Japan is designed to balance China’s hegemony,” Rajrishi Singhal, a Mumbai-based independent policy consultant, told AFP.

The two countries have close security ties and hold regular joint military exercises.

A proposed joint investment of billions of dollars in Africa is set to be the cornerstone of the relationship, Mr. Singhal said.

“India truly values the relationship with Japan and we look forward to further boosting our bilateral ties in a wide range of sectors,” Mr. Modi tweeted Tuesday.

There are more than 1,500 Japanese companies in India, including auto major Suzuki, the largest car maker in the country.

The success of Suzuki and others transformed India’s auto industry, which employs millions today.

Experts are pinning similar hopes on the bullet train project.

“Just like Suzuki changed India’s car market and brought millions of jobs, the bullet train will change the entire industry,” Mr. Singhal said. — AFP

ISLAMORADA, FLORIDA — Hurricane Irma evacuees began returning to the storm-ravaged Florida Keys on Tuesday to find homes ripped apart and businesses coated in seaweed amid a debris-strewn landscape where an estimated 25% of all dwellings were destroyed.

The death toll from Irma, previously ranked as one of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record and the second major hurricane to strike the US mainland this season, climbed to more than five dozen. Of those, 43 were killed in the Caribbean and at least 18 in the Southeastern United States.

Twelve Irma-related fatalities were confirmed by Florida emergency management officials on Tuesday, while authorities in Georgia and South Carolina each reported three deaths from the storm and its immediate aftermath.

Destruction was widespread in the Keys, a resort island chain stretching southwest from the tip of the Florida Peninsula into the Gulf of Mexico and connected by a single, narrow highway and a series of bridges and causeways along a route of nearly 100 miles (160 km).

“I don’t have a house. I don’t have a job. I have nothing,” said Mercedes Lopez, 50, whose family fled north from the Florida Keys town of Marathon last Friday and rode out the storm at an Orlando hotel, only to learn their home was destroyed, along with the gasoline station where he worked.

“We came here, leaving everything at home, and we go back to nothing,” Ms. Lopez said. Her and three other families from Marathon planned to venture back on Wednesday to salvage what they can.

Initial damage assessments found 25% of homes in the Keys were destroyed and 65% with major damage, according to Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator Brock Long.

“Basically every house in the Keys was impacted,” he told reporters.

The islands were largely evacuated by the time Irma barreled ashore on Sunday as a Category 4 hurricane with sustained winds of up to 130 mph (215 km/hour).

‘SAILBOAT IN OUR YARD’
Authorities began allowing reentry to the islands of Key Largo, Tavernier and Islamorada two days later for residents and business owners only. The extent of the devastation took many by surprise.

“I expected some fence lines to be down and some debris,” said Dr. Orlando Morejon, 51, a trauma surgeon from Miami as he hacked away at a tree blocking his Islamorada driveway. “We were not expecting to find someone else’s sailboat in our backyard.”

The walls of nearby trailer homes were left ripped wide open, exposing insulation and the sodden interiors of bedrooms and kitchens to the elements.

At the Caloosa Cove Resort and Marina, concrete pilings meant to hold the dock in place had been knocked sideways, and three manatees lolled in the water, drinking from an outflow pump spitting water from the dockside.

Marilyn Ramos, 44, spent the morning cleaning sand and seaweed that had covered her Cuban restaurant Havanos when she arrived early Tuesday.

“I’m trying to stay calm and see how we can work through this,” Ms. Ramos said. “It’s devastating.”

A short distance away, the scent of decaying seaweed hung heavy in the air as Brooke Gilbert, 15, stood with her younger sister staring at the jumble of concrete and twisted metal left from the three-story condo that was their family’s getaway home.

“There’s the couch right there,” she said. “I recognize the clothes in that closet. They belong to my grandmother.”

At the end of Islamorada, roughly the halfway point of the Keys, police at a checkpoint turned around returning residents seeking to travel farther south and waved through utility crews, law enforcement and health care workers.

Authorities said they were barring reentry to the remainder of the Keys to allow more time to restore electricity, water, fuel supplies and medical service. US officials have said some 10,000 Keys residents stayed put when the storm hit and may ultimately need to be evacuated.

LINGERING OUTAGES, FLOODING
Some 5.8 million homes and businesses were still without power in Florida and nearby states late on Tuesday, down from a peak of about 7.4 million on Monday. Florida’s largest utility, Florida Power & Light Co, said western parts of the state might be without electricity until Sept. 22.

One of the chief hardships endured by many Floridians in the storm’s aftermath was difficulty staying cool in the absence of air conditioning, ice and even natural shade from trees knocked down or stripped bare of foliage.

“I just pour water on my head a few times a day,” said Lydia Grondin, 29, of Fort Lauderdale.

Florida’s largest city, Jacksonville in the northeastern corner of the state, was still recovering from heavy flooding on Tuesday.

While damage across Florida was severe, it paled in scope to the devastation wrought by Irma in parts of the Caribbean, which accounted for the bulk of Irma’s fatalities. — Reuters