LA-Bound Train Plows Into Truck, Driver Flees

Some 30 injuries reported; driver has been apprehended
By Polly Davis Doig,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 24, 2015 9:14 AM CST
Updated Feb 24, 2015 10:39 AM CST
LA-Bound Commuter Train Plows Into Truck, Derails
This image from video provided by KABC-TV Los Angeles shows wreckage of a Metrolink commuter train after it crashed into a truck and derailed early on Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015.   (AP Photo/KABC-TV)

At least 30 people were reportedly injured after a Los Angeles-bound commuter train plowed into a truck on the tracks early today, reports KTLA, with three cars of the Metrolink train derailing and falling onto their sides. The crash, in Ventura County some 65 miles northwest of LA, was reported at 5:44am local time. A police rep in Oxnard says the truck burst into flames and was fully engulfed, reports the AP, with little more than scorched and mangled wreckage remaining.

Television images show numerous ambulances and firetrucks on the scene. ABC News reports the driver of the truck fled but was subsequently apprehended and is in custody. CNN adds by way of another Oxnard police official that the driver had "stopped his produce truck on the tracks." It's not yet known why he was stopped. CNN adds that a 2008 Metrolink crash that killed 25 people spurred an investment in "collision energy management technology," and that likely prevented the cars from "crumpling" this morning. (More Metrolink stories.)

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