At least 40 people were killed and 60 injured on Wednesday when a truck failed to stop at a level crossing and pushed waiting traffic into the path of a speeding train in northern Egypt, police said.

The truck ploughed into traffic at the level crossing, including a bus and at least four other vehicles, pushing them into the path of the passenger train.

Two train carriages overturned and another two were derailed, a police official said, requesting anonymity.

The accident occurred 80 kilometres east of Marsa Matruh in the Mediterranean coastal region of Dabaa, the official said.

The crash is the latest in a series of transport disasters in Egypt, most of which have been blamed on negligence and poor maintenance.

At least 58 people were killed and 144 injured in August 2006 when a passenger train slammed into the back of another on the same track, derailing carriages and setting one train ablaze.

Egypt's deadliest rail disaster occurred in February 2002, when a passenger using a stove set ablaze a train heading to the south of the country, killing at least 361 people.

AFP