(The following article by Sylvain Metz was posted on the Jackson Clarion-Ledger website on July 13.)
ANDING, Miss. — A railroad recovery worker surveys the wreckage left when two freight trains collided head-on and burned on the tracks near Anding.
The body of a fourth crew member missing since Sunday’s head-on collision of two Canadian National freight trains in the Anding community in Yazoo County was recovered Tuesday, Yazoo County Coroner Ricky Shivers said.
The discovery was made about 2:45 p.m. after train engines were righted to allow a search of the area.
Preliminary autopsies have been conducted and DNA samples taken on the other three victims whose bodies were pulled from the wreckage Sunday and Monday, Shivers said. Those DNA samples, to be matched with samples from family members, will be used to positively identify the remains.
Identification is expected to take a couple of days, Shivers said.
No autopsy results are available, he said.
Although officials have not released the names of the dead pending verification and notification of next of kin, family members have identified two victims believed to have been on the trains. They are Shannon Purvis, 21, of Puckett and Mark Cain, 52, of Sallis.
The head-on-collision — the second in two weeks — is being investigated by the National Transportation Safety Board.
Keith Holloway, a spokesman for the NTSB, had no new information to offer Tuesday.
In addition to the NTSB investigation, CN is conducting its own internal investigation, said Karen Phillips, spokeswoman for Canadian National Railroad in Washington, D.C. “We will fully cooperate with their investigation (too),” she said.
Phillips acknowledged the loss has been hard on CN employees. “It’s really hard to lose people,” Phillips said.
The line was reopened Monday night. Amtrak, which operates The City of New Orleans between Chicago and New Orleans, via Jackson, temporarily had suspended service between Memphis and New Orleans on Sunday and Monday. Full service resumed Tuesday, according to Amtrak’s official Web site.