NTSB Analyzing LA-Area Train Crash

PLACENTIA, Calif. -- National Transportation Safety Board investigators are at the site of a deadly train crash in Southern California.

NTSB Chairman Marion Blakey told reporters Tuesday night that teams of investigators have boarded the cars of the Metrolink train to survey the damage.

Blakey said the Metrolink train was stopped on the track in Placentia when it was hit head-on by a Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train.

Blakey said investigators will spend three to five days at the site. They'll be looking at several factors, including whether the signals were working properly, the condition of the track and radio traffic between dispatchers.

She said it could take weeks or months to determine a cause for the crash.

Authorities are also scaling back the number of dead from Tuesday's collision.

The Sheriff's Department said there were two deaths, not three as previously feared. One victim was counted twice.

The victims are identified as a 48-year-old man who died at the scene and a 59-year-old man who died at a hospital.

Authorities report there are dozens of serious injuries, and increased earlier reports of the number of people aboard the Metrolink passenger train to 265. The stopped southbound commuter passenger train was struck by a northbound freight train. Initial reports indicated both vehicles were southbound, and the crash was the result of a rear-end collision. It is now believed the crash was head-on. The confusion appears to have come from the fact that the Metrolink train was being pushed by the engine instead of pulled. Witnesses say the freight engine plowed into the passenger car at the head of the stopped Metrolink train.

A triage unit had been set up beside the accident scene. Officials said there was a tremendous amount of "walking wounded" and several patients on the ground were unable to move.

The one fatality was reported by Orange County Coroner's office deputy Cullen Ellingburgh. One Anaheim hospital said it received 10 patients, two in guarded condition. Two passengers from the train were reported in critical condition at another hospital in Fullerton.

The Orange County Fire Authority said 25 persons from the train required immediate medical treatment at the scene, where 30 ambulances lined up to take the injured to hospitals.

Fire-rescue personnel used ladders to get to injured people on the upper-level of one of the two-decker commuter rail cars. The southbound Metrolink commuter train with an engine and three passenger cars was struck by a freight train that is about one-mile long with about 75 rail cars.

The Metrolink train was stopped on the track when a Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train, traveling at about 30 mph hit the rear car of the commuter train about 8:10 a.m.

Passenger Kim Bailey said: "I was thrown forward onto my knees with my face into the seat, and I was just confused. I just saw darkness and I didn't know what happened."

A passenger on the train told MSNBC that the train came to a complete stop for about a minute and they didn't know what was going on and there was just an intense hit. And she said a lot of people just fell out of their seats and were injured and seats were ripped off. She said it wasn't as crowded as it could've been because it was the last train.

She said a lot of people sitting in the direction in which the train was going were in the worst position and they were injured the worst.

Another passenger aboard the Metrolink commuter train was Scott Wilson. He said the train stopped for a couple of seconds and then was struck by the freight train, also southbound. "For me, I was facing backward. Maybe that's how I ended up being OK," Wilson said.

Firefighters carried some of injured out of the train while many passengers in rear cars walked away on their own.

One unidentified witness said the Metrolink commuter train was stopped on the track when the Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train, traveling at about 30 mph, hit the rear of the passenger train. The Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad owns and maintains the stretch of rail where the collision occurred. The railroad BNSF runs 55 freight trains a day along the line also used by the commuter trains.

Earlier this month another southbound Metrolink commuter train struck a big-rig making a U-turn on the railroad tracks. The truck driver was killed, but none of the 115 passengers were hurt in that crash on April 8.