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Tag: crashes

  • Train Derailment Injures Dozens in Arkansas

    Disaster struck on Thursday as a freight train collided with a passenger train in Washington County, Arkansas. The accident has left dozens injured and has prompted an investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

    According to a report from Little Rock NBC affiliate KARK, five people were critically injured in the crash and at least 20 more were injured in some way. There were reportedly 44 people on-board the passenger train at the time of the crash. Several of those injured were reported to have been train crew members.

    The NTSB announced yesterday that it has launched an investigation into the incident. An NTSB “go-team” of railroad investigators has been sent to the site of the crash. The team is expected to be at the scene of the accident for five to seven days to collect perishable evidence.

    The KARK report quotes police as stating the passenger train left Springdale, Arkansas early Thursday morning and later slipped off its tracks. The freight train was reportedly sent for aid, but ended up crashing into the passenger train.

    According to the NTSB the passenger train, made up of one locomotive and four cars, stalled in what is called “dark territory” – a section of track controlled by a railroad’s operations control center rather than signals. The cause of the stall has not yet been determined.

    An NTSB spokesperson went on to state that the rescue train dispatched to help collided head-on with the passenger train’s lead engine. Both trains were derailed as a result of the crash, though no fuel was released and there were no fires. Both of the trains had forward-facing video recorders that should help investigators determine the cause of the accident. The official number of passengers injured in the crash has not yet been determined.

    The next NTSB media briefing has been scheduled for Friday at 5 pm EDT in Springdale.

  • Florida Bus Crash Involves School Bus, Naked Woman

    Car crashes happen every day all over the world and are so common that the majority of them do not even make local headlines. There are exceptions, of course. Someone like Jennifer Lopez being rear-ended is bound to make the tabloids. Also, Florida. Florida is always an exception.

    On Monday a log truck slammed into the back of a school bus in Starke, Florida. According to a Florida Times-Union report a chaotic scene involving children crying and a naked woman lying nearby played out as rescue workers arrived at the crash site.

    A Bradford County, Florida sheriff told the Times-Union that some children were trapped on the bus when he arrived. The sheriff also stated that the injured, naked woman appeared to have been thrown from the truck during the crash.

    Post by The Florida Times-Union.

    Fifteen children were aboard the bus when the crash occurred and seven were taken to the hospital for injuries. Three adults were also injured in the crash – the bus driver, the truck driver, and the naked woman (later determined to be the truck driver’s wife). No one died as a result of the crash.

    What exactly caused the crash has not yet been determined. The most intriguing question surrounding the incident – why the woman was naked – has also not yet been determined.

    According to the Times-Union report the crash occurred at a school bus stop on U.S. 301 on Monday afternoon while the bus was dropping off elementary school students. It was raining at the time and some parents were waiting at the bus stop. The bus driver saw the truck speeding toward the bus and hit the accelerator before the crash, mitigating some of the impact. Even so, the truck slammed into the bus without breaking, pushing it about 40 yards into a field by the road. Witnesses told the newspaper that the truck’s engine became dislodged as the truck jacknifed into a ditch.

    The Times-Union has since reported that the truck had been stopped and inspected in Nassau County at around noon on Monday. Authorities had been alerted that the log truck, which was not carrying a load, was driving recklessly.

  • I-40 Crash In Tennessee Leaves 8 Dead And 14 Injured

    Today is a sad day for the folks in Jefferson County, Tennessee, as a terrible accident involving a tractor trailer, a bus, and a passenger vehicle have left 8 people dead and 14 injured. The accident between these vehicles happened at mile marker 423 along the Tennessee stretch of the I-40 interstate. (Source: Examiner.com).

    According to WBIR (the NBC affiliate in Knoxville, TN) and the THP (Tennessee Highway Patrol), the crash happened at 2 p.m. on October 2nd when the left front tire of the church bus blew out, causing the driver to lose control of the bus and crash into a tractor trailer and an SUV on the other side of the interstate’s median. This caused the tractor trailer to catch fire, and the church bus overturned.

    The Director of Jefferson County’s EMA, Brad Phillips told WBIR that “the local rescue squad extricated several passengers from the bus, which was very close to the burning tractor-trailer.” However, Phillips could not provide the number of how many people needed to be rescued, but he did state that most of the rescued patrons were out within 15 minutes of the squad’s arrival.

    Unfortunately, this crash resulted in fatalities. According to Examiner.com, six passengers from the church bus were killed, along with one from the tractor trailer, and the other one in the SUV, resulting in eight fatalities. The other 14 people involved in this crash encountered non-life-threatening injuries and were airlifted by helicopter to a nearby hospital.

    WBIR states that the names of the victims have not been released yet and that the fatalities will be taken to the University of Tennessee’s forensic center to be identified at a later time. The church bus was from Front Street Baptist Church in Statesville, North Carolina.

    Various users of the Twitterverse reach out and mourn the victims with the families involved in this horrific accident.

    [Image source: WBIR]

  • TWA Flight 800: NTSB Responds to Calls for New Investigation

    In July 1996, TWA Flight 800 exploded over the Atlantic Ocean near New York, just minutes after taking off from JFK International Airport. All 230 people on board the flight died in the crash.

    Now, almost 17 years later, former investigators are urging authorities to re-open the investigation into the cause of the crash. According to the Associated Press, the call are being made just prior to the release of a new documentary on the event that claims to show new evidence that TWA Flight 800 was shot down by a missile. A petition has been filed with the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

    The new documentary, titled TWA Flight 800, is scheduled to air July 17 on the Epic premium cable TV channel. According to Epix, the movie features “six former member of the official crash investigation breaking their silence to refute the officially proposed cause of the jetliner’s demise and reveal how the investigation was systematically undermined.”

    The FBI had initially investigated the crash as a possible missile attack. The NTSB’s final report stated that the explosion on the flight was due to the ignition of the fuel/air mix in the plane’s center wing fuel tank, likely caused by an electrical short circuit.

    The NTSB today released a statement regarding the petition, emphasizing that its 4-year investigation into the crash was one of the board’s most extensive investigations ever. From the statement:

    The NTSB today received a petition for reconsideration of its investigation into the July 17, 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800. As required by NTSB regulation, a petition for reconsideration of Board findings or a probable cause determination must be based on the discovery of new evidence or on a showing that the Board’s findings are erroneous. The NTSB will review the details of the petition to determine if it meets the requirements set forth in the regulation.

    The TWA Flight 800 investigation lasted four years and remains one of the NTSB’s most detailed investigations. Investigators took great care reviewing, documenting and analyzing facts and data and the NTSB held a five-day hearing to gather additional facts before determining the probable cause of the accident during a two-day Board meeting.

    The NTSB pointed out that its 400-page report on the crash has been available publicly for over a decade. It also stated that 17,000 pages of supporting material from the board’s docket is also publicly available.

    (via AP)

  • EagleMed Crash Kills 1, Prompts Questions

    EagleMed Crash Kills 1, Prompts Questions

    A medical helicopter crash killed a patient and injured a medical worker on Tuesday near Tulsa, Oklahoma.

    According to Choctaw Nation Health Services, an investigation into the crash and the safety record of EagleMed, the company that owned the helicopter, is now underway. EagleMed is a medical transport company that operates around 20 different locations throughout the midwestern U.S.

    The helicopter crashed on Tuesday night, less than 100 feet away from Choctaw Nation Healthcare Center (CNHCC) near Talihina, Oklahoma, where it had taken off from on the way to Tulsa. Though hospital emergency workers were nearby to treat the passengers, 49-year-old Michael Wilson, the patient on the flight, died. One member of the flight crew was critically injured, and was taken to a trauma center in Tulsa. The two other members of the crew were not seriously injured.

    “Our staff responded extremely well to this unfortunate tragedy”, said Teresa Jackson, CNHCC CEO. “We engaged our disaster plan within moments of the accident, and the response from our staff as well as the local and state emergency personnel in the area was outstanding.”

    The cause of the crash has yet to be determined, though the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), Choctaw Nation law enforcement officials, and an Eagle Med safety team are all currently investigating the incident.

    EagleMed has expressed its thanks to well-wishers during what it calls a “difficult time.”

    (image)

    EagleMed LLC1 day ago

    Thank you for the thoughts, prayers and concern for our crew at EagleMed.McAlester. Your support and love brings us comfort in this difficult time. Those planning to attend the 10th Anniversary event scheduled at EagleMed6.Tahlequah today, the event has been post-poned until further notice. Powered by socialditto(image)  90 likes ·  9 comments

    According to Tulsa’s KXII news station, this is the third EagleMed helicopter to have crashed in just the state of Oklahoma since 2010.

  • Planes Collide Over Arizona, Killing Four

    Planes Collide Over Arizona, Killing Four

    Two small planes collided in midair just north of Phoenix, Arizona on Friday, killing four people.

    According to a KSAZ report, the planes were both single-engine, with two people aboard each. The collision occurred on Friday morning, about 15 miles northwest of Deer Valley Airport in Phoenix.

    The details of the crash have not yet been determined. Witnesses only reported seeing the two planes crash in midair. One of the planes was reportedly left relatively intact, while the other was, according to KSAZ, “charred wreckage.”

    The Phoenix-based TransPac Aviation Academy has revealed that two of those killed were flight instructors for the academy. The organization has stated that it will set up a memorial fund for the families of those who died.

    “I was terribly saddened to learn of the loss of two of our members of the TransPac Aviation Academy family,” said Stephen Goddard, CEO of TransPac. “We extend our deepest condolences to the family, friends, and fellow colleagues of the two instructors that were lost today. The individuals involved were deeply connected here at TransPac and their loss is felt by all of us. The entire extended TransPac community, including our Alumni, is in shock and mourning for the loss of both of these two good men. We are not releasing personal information about the individuals at this time out of respect for the families during this time of sadness and grieving.”

    Goddard stated that TransPac is cooperating with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) on the investigation of the accident.