Amtrak train on new route hurtles onto highway, kills 3
Attention quickly turned to the train's speed. Federal investigators say the train was traveling at 80 mph (129 kph) in a 30 mph (48 kph) zone.
Dinh-Zarr said it's not yet known what caused the train to derail and that "it's too early to tell" why it was going so fast.
She said federal investigators will likely be on scene for a week or more.
There were 80 passengers and five on-duty crew on board when the train derailed and pulled 13 cars off the tracks. Authorities said there were three confirmed deaths. More than 70 people were taken for medical care — including 10 with serious injuries.
About two hours after the accident, a
The official was not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
A track chart prepared by the
The chart, dated
Positive train control — the technology that can slow or stop a speeding train — wasn't in use on this stretch of track, according to Amtrak President
He spoke on a conference call with reporters, said he was "deeply saddened by all that has happened today."
In a radio transmission immediately after the accident, the conductor can be heard saying the train was coming around a corner and was crossing a bridge that passed over
"I'm still figuring that out. We've got cars everywhere and down onto the highway," he tells the dispatcher, who asks if everyone is OK.
"I was just coming out of the bathroom when the accident happened. My car just started shaking really, really badly," he said.
The back of his train car was wide open because it had separated from the rest of the train, so he and others were able to jump out to safety. He was at about the middle of the train, either the sixth or seventh car, he said, and was "one of the lucky ones."
She awoke to find her body at a 45-degree angle and her train car dangling from the overpass. Someone behind her was pinned by the legs, she said, and she and others who could walk exited the train by crawling onto a car underneath theirs that had been crushed.
"It felt oddly silent after the actual crashing. There was a lot of metal, a lot of screeching, a lot of being thrown around. It was very quiet. Then there was people screaming," Shafer said.
"I don't know if I actually heard the sirens, but they were there. A guy was like, 'Hey, I'm Robert. We'll get you out of here.'"
Dr.
The most seriously injured had already been whisked away, but the patients he helped appeared to have open head wounds and skull, pelvic or leg fractures, as well as small cuts and neck sprains, he said.
He called it a miracle an infant child he saw from the scene appeared completely unharmed.
President
The train was making the inaugural run on the new route as part of a
The Amtrak Cascades service that runs from
The Amtrak schedule called for the train to leave
The new bypass was built on an existing inland rail line that runs along
The mayor of
"Once we were coming up on that curve, the train slowed down considerably," he said, adding that "in no way did it make me feel like we were going too fast."
This story has been updated to reflect that authorities said Monday night that three people died. A
Flaccus reported from
Latin American Headlines at 12:25 a.m. EST
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