Three killed after passenger train collides with lorry and derails in Missouri
At least three people have been killed and around 50 people are said to have been injured after several carriages of a passenger train derailed on its way from Los Angeles to Chicago.
The Amtrak Southwest Chief train was carrying about 243 passengers and around 12 crew members when it collided with a lorry at an “uncontrolled” railroad crossing in a rural area of Missouri, said a highway patrol spokesman.
Two people on the train died along with one person in the truck near Mendon.
Missouri State Highway Patrol said there were also multiple injuries but they would not specify how many.
Hospitals reported receiving more than 40 patients from the crash and were expecting more.
The train had eight carriages, seven of which derailed.
All the passengers and crew have been taken from the scene.
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The collision happened at a rural intersection on a gravel road with no crossing barrier, patrol spokesman Corporal Justin Dunn said.
Uncontrolled crossings are generally ones without gates and red warning lights.
A 911 call about the crash was made at 12.43pm on Monday and the first emergency responders arrived within 20 minutes, he said.
Nearly 20 local and state law enforcement agencies, ambulance services, fire department and medical services took part in the rescue operation, he added.
Amtrak earlier said its incident response team had been activated, and emergency personnel were being sent to the site to “help support our passengers, our employees and their families with their needs”.
Passenger Robert Nightingale said he was sleeping on the train when the incident happened.
“Everything started to go in slow motion,” he told CNN, describing how the train rocked before tumbling onto its side.
Mr Nightingale was able to climb out of the side of the carriage. “We all just sat there shocked,” he said.
Other passengers included 16 youths and eight adults from two boy scout troops who were travelling home to Appleton, Wisconsin, after a trip to the Philmont scout ranch in New Mexico.
But no one in the group was seriously injured, said Scott Armstrong, a spokesman for the Boy Scouts of America.
The scouts gave first aid to several injured passengers, including the driver of the lorry, he added.
Dax McDonald was on the train and his pictures, shared with Sky News, show several rail carriages on their sides with escaped passengers standing on top.
Mendon is about 84 miles northeast of Kansas City in the centre of the United States.
Passengers have been taken from the scene to University Hospital in Columbia, hospital spokesman Eric Maze said.
There is no detailed information on their conditions.
