(The Associated Press circulated the following story on August 6.)
CAMARILLO, Calif. — All 18 Amtrak passengers and crew members taken to hospitals after their train collided with a dump truck had been released by Saturday morning, officials said.
The two people in the truck were hospitalized with serious injuries but their condition was not known, said Joe Luna, spokesman for the Ventura County Fire Department. The crossing where the crash occurred has flashing lights and gates that were functioning, Amtrak spokeswoman Vernae Graham said.
A front train car that partially derailed was put back on track early Saturday and there were no service delays on the line, though some passengers heading to Southern California from Seattle and Northern California had to take buses for part of the trip, Graham said.
Passengers described “pandemonium” inside the San Diego-bound Surfliner passenger train when it crashed Friday night in the Somis farming area north of Camarillo. The area is west of Moorpark and about 50 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles.
“It was the most terrifying thing I have gone through in my life,” Diane Morrison, 60, of Lake Forest, told the Ventura County Star. “The train made a complete stop all of a sudden, and I was thrown into the seat in front of me.”
“It was like a violent car accident followed by a massive jolt,” said Greg Watsworth, 23, of Los Angeles. Then there was “an insane smell of brakes burning.”
The speed limit in the area is 69 mph but it was unclear how fast the train was moving, Graham said. The Surfliner was propelled by an engine pushing several cars from behind. The train left Santa Barbara around 7 p.m. Friday and was en route to Union Station in Los Angeles.
In 2002, two people were killed in the Somis area in separate crashes after trains struck their vehicles.