A Metrolink commuter train collided with a freight train Friday afternoon, killing up to 15 people according to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. News reports said the accident killed at least 10 and injured at least 100 other passengers. Ten of those are critically injured.
The passenger train, believed to be carrying around 350 to 400 people, collided with a Union Pacific freight train at approximately 4:23 p.m. in Chatsworth, a northwestern suburb of Los Angeles.
A fire started soon after the collision, and firefighters put out the fire under the wreckage. News reports said firefighters pulled people from the Metrolink cars.
One passenger car in the Metrolink Train 111 was overturned.
Television broadcasts showed firefighters and other medical personnel treating the injured near the train debris in makeshift triages.
News reports said nearby hospitals are on trauma alert status and received injured people.
Eight patients involved in the accident are currently being treated in the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center’s emergency department, according to a UCLA Health Sciences statement.
The Ronald Reagan Center is asking for healthy blood donors of all types to donate to the patients. The donation center is open Saturday from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. To make an appointment, the UCLA Blood and Platelet Center can be reached at (310) 794-7217.
Los Angeles City Fire Capt. Kurt Fasmer told KABC-TV Channel 7 that approximately 130 ambulances have responded to the accident to transport critically injured passengers to hospitals.
Other news reports said that more than 100 firefighters, 120 sheriff deputies and 200 Los Angeles Police Department officers took part in the rescue.
Denise Tyrell, a Metrolink spokeswoman, said it remains unclear what caused the collision, and passengers are still being evacuated from the wreckage.
Tyrell told KABC-TV Channel 7 that the two trains were on the same track at the same time, but officials have yet to figure out the reason for the crash.
“Something went wrong, somewhere, and we will get to the bottom of this,” Tyrell said in a phone interview with KABC-TV Channel 7.
Another fatal but unrelated train accident occurred in Corona when a Metrolink train hit a vehicle on the track just after 5 p.m. Friday, according to a KTLA Channel 5 news report. The unidentified driver of the vehicle, a woman in her 40s, was the only person killed in the accident.
With additional reports by Carolyn McGough, Bruin senior staff