At least six dead as train hurtles onto busy motorway near Seattle
● Train derails at overpass after safety fears raised
A train making its maiden run along a faster new route hurtled off an overpass in the United States and fallen onto a main road, killing at least six people.
Seventy-eight passengers and five crew members were aboard when the Amtrak train moving at more than 80mph derailed on the bridge about 40 miles south of Seattle. Safety concerns had previously been raised over the route. The death toll is expected to rise.
An official said preliminary signs indicated Train 501 may have struck something before going off the track.
The Pierce County Sheriff’s Office said several vehicles on Interstate 5 were struck by falling train carriages and that multiple motorists were injured. No fatalities among motorists were reported.
At least two people remain in a critical condition and 11 othtruck ers are seriously injured. Four hospitals confirmed that 50 people in total had been hospitalised. At least one person was in surgery yesterday.
Passenger Chris Karnes was on the train, three or four carriages back from the front. He said the only part of the train remaining on the tracks was the rear locomotive. Several cars were hanging over the overpass.
The possibility the wreck was caused by something on the tracks fed into concerns voiced by local officials about the risk of high-speed trains crossing busy streets. The mayor of a town near the derailment site had warned about the danger of an accident at a public meeting only a fortnight ago.
Daniel Konzelman, 24, was driving parallel to the train on his way to work as an accountant in Olympia. He was about 30 seconds ahead of the train on the motorway when he saw it derail.
Mr Konzelman said he pulled off the road and then ran down along the tracks and over the bridge to get to the scene. He saw three cars and a large on the road that had been damaged by the derailment. There were train carriages with their roofs ripped off or tipped upside down on both sides of the track.
He climbed into the carriages and found people hurt – some pinned underneath the train and others who appeared to be dead. He said if they were mobile and seemed stable, he helped them climb out. If they appeared seriously hurt, he tried to comfort them by talking to them, adding: “I just wanted to help people because I would want people to help me.”
President Donald Trump used the deadly derailment to call for more infrastructure spending in a tweet sent about three hours after the accident. He said the wreck, on a newly completed bypass, showed “more than ever why our soon-to-be submitted infrastructure plan must be approved quickly”. The train was making the inaugural run on the new route as part of a $180.7 million (£134m) project designed to speed up services by removing passenger trains from a route along Puget Sound that is bogged down by curves, single-track tunnels and freight traffic.
The Amtrak schedule called for the train to leave Seattle about 2pm GMT and arrive in Portland about three and a half hours later.
The new route includes a bypass built on an existing inland rail line that runs along Interstate 5 from Tacoma to Dupont, near where Train 501 derailed. Track testing was completed in January and February in advance of Monday’s launch.
The mayor of Lakewood – a city along the new route – had predicted a deadly crash, but one involving a fast-moving train hitting a car or pedestrian at a crossing. At a recent public meeting, Don Anderson had called on state planners to build overpass-like rail structures instead of having trains cross busy streets.
The train is believed to have been going at 81.1mph moments before the derailment. The maximum speed along the stretch of track is 79mph.