Train collision in Nevada today... watch your local News

[NarrowMinded]

A  Semi truck ran the crossing today and collided with a Amtrak train in Nevada 200+ passengers on board, the train caught fire.

Idiot!

NM-Jeff

[Doneldon]

Jeff-

I don't care what you're driving, unless it's another train, you're gonna lose if you try to occupy the same space at the same time with a train. It knocks me out that people still don't understand that.

My Dad worked for the Central in the 1940s and then the Santa Fe until he died so, unsurprisingly, he was in several train wrecks. I've got official pictures from the Santa Fe wrecks and you just wouldn't believe the damage.
                                                                                                                                            -- D

[NarrowMinded]

I will never understand why people take those risks, I knew train/car collisions were high, but on the news today they said some type of train collision happens on average every 100 minutes, I had to rewind and watch it again... to make sure I did not hear it wrong.

NM-Jeff

[BillingsRR]

I saw it on the news too. I don't think it is just any old collision though.

[Michigan Railfan]

I saw this on the news as well. They said the truck hit the train. Usually it's the other way around. They said one passenger and the truck driver were the only fatalities. I don't understand how someone can actually hit a train unless your blind. And they were superliners of all things. More shiny, taller and longer than most frieght cars. It just boggles me. 

[Doneldon]

Blink-

"I don't understand how someone can actually hit a train unless your blind."

I think a lot of people are blind. How often you hear of somebody running into a police car while the officer is stopped to write a ticket and all the lights in the world are flashing on the squad?
                                                                                                   -- D

[Johnson Bar Jeff]

Just saw a report on this on the NBC Nightly News. NBC's film made it look like the whole consist of the train burned. NBC also suggested that there might be more deaths. 

[glennk28]

Can a driver be cited for violating Newton's Laws of Motion?

[Doneldon]

They said the truck hit the train.

In the immortal words of Sancho Panza, "Whether the stone hits the pitcher or the pitcher hits the stone, it's gonna be bad for the pitcher."

[Jhanecker2]

Saw the story when I was out of town.  Two  passenger cars were burned , the one confirmed death was a railroad employee on the train . The driver of the semi also died in the crash. The NTSB and  other government agencies were going to be investigating for about 10 Days.  They were going to have to check the burned out passenger cars for more bodies.  The truckdriver left skidmarks from slamming on the brakes but   was a little to late.  J2

[Johnson Bar Jeff]

Last I heard this morning the official death toll is up to six, I believe, including a "conductor," and they think there may be more bodies in the burned-out cars.    I also heard they're having trouble accounting for everyone.

(I put conductor in quotation marks because I don't trust TV news to get the  job titles correct for all the employees on a train like the Zephyr.)

[jward]

vehicles crashing into the sides of moving trains are not as rare as you'd think. when i worked with the railroad it happened to us twice.

[Michigan Railfan]

How bad did the cars burn? From what I saw on the news there was a fire on the side of one car. And  there can't be that many dead because they all most likely ran away from the fire while inside the car, unless the car just instantly burned.

[Doneldon]

Blink-

"they all most likely ran away from the fire while inside the car"

...or it instantly was turned into scrap metal.

                                      -- D

[NarrowMinded]

I saw two that looked gutted and burned through the aluminum skins.

NM-Jeff