Amtrak's City of New Orleans Collides With Truck

Related Stories Amtrak train derails after hitting truck. (March 16) (Note: To return to this story, click the "Back" button on your browser.)

BYRAM, Miss. (AP) — Authorities said they were thankful no passengers were injured in an accident involving Amtrak's City of New Orleans outside Jackson.

A tractor-trailer rig apparently ran in front of the train Monday at a crossing. The train engineer suffered minor injuries in the collision.

"We are very fortunate that the train hit the truck behind the cab," Hinds County Emergency Management Director Larry Fisher said. "It could have been much worse. The train could have derailed. There could have been an explosion, but the truck was carrying nontoxic materials."

Fisher said the train was traveling about 79 mph when the truck failed to make it across the crossing in the Byram Industrial Park about 11:20 a.m.

The southbound train hit the trailer part of truck, scattering what Fisher described as non-hazardous chemicals and some chlorine tanks. Fisher said no chlorine tanks were damaged. Mangled metal pieces and a destroyed stop sign were strewn across the tracks.

Ty Davis of Jackson, a truck driver who witnessed the accident, said the driver did not stop at the crossing. Davis said he could hear the train's horn.

"He (the engineer) was sounding it loud," Davis said.

The train's engineer, Wayne Matthews of Baton Rouge, La., was treated and released from Baptist Medical Center in Jackson for a head injury.

Amtrak spokesman Derrick James in Chicago said there were 107 passengers on the train but none were hurt.

James said the train had left Chicago Sunday night and was just south of Jackson when the accident occurred.

The lead locomotive was damaged and was left at the Byram site, James said. The City of New Orleans continued on to New Orleans about 1:25 p.m. after the debris was cleared up, he said.

The truck, owned by Harcross Chemicals Co. of Jackson, had been making a delivery to an animal processing plant at the Byram Industrial Park.

Malloy Annison, general manager of Griffin Industries where the truck driver was making the delivery, said the driver did not look where he was going.

"But he wasn't hurt," Annison said. "The truck was smashed up but he wasn't hurt. He got out of the truck and called his boss."

John Newman, senior operations manager for Harcross Chemicals, said the company is investigating the incident. He declined to identify the truck driver.

The City of New Orleans was involved in a March 15 crash with a truck in which 11 people were killed in Illinois.