[加拿大新聞] Multiple fatalities’ as Via Rail train, following, multiple, reported, between, station

tiffiant

Multiple fatalities’ as Via Rail train, Ottawa double-decker city bus collide
OTTAWA - Ottawa police say an Ottawa bus driver and four passengers are dead following a crash between a bus and VIA Rail train near the Fallowfield station in Barrhaven, south of Ottawa, Tuesday morning.
There were multiple injuries as well.
===

Witnesses say the bus appeared to ignore warning signals at the crossing.
Via Rail said there were no major injuries reported on the train, but it suspended its Ottawa-Toronto service.
Pascal Lolgis, who witnessed the crash, said the bus appeared to drive through a lowered crossing barrier.
"Boom! It went into the train like that,"Lolgis said. "He didn't stop. He must have lost his brakes. Or he had an ... attack or whatever.
"He just didn't stop. He just keep going like that. Then he get hit."
Another witness, Mark Cogan, said the rail barrier was down.
"The train is going through," Cogan said. "And I was just looking around, just watching things happen. And noticed that in the bus lane, the double-decker bus ... I saw him and he just kept going.
"I just thought maybe there's a side way around or something but instantly he just ... he smoked the train. He went through the guard rail and just hammered the train and then it was just mayhem."
Robert Kurtenbach was on the top level of the bus on his way to work downtown.
He said the bus had gone about half a kilometre from the Transitway station when suddenly he was aware a train was right in front of the bus.
“The bus didn’t appear to slow down,” he said, and the front end slammed hard into the side of the train.
People screamed, and he was thrown forward and twisted his leg, but feels he is lucky not to have been hurt worse.
Those at the front were badly hurt, he said.
“I could see bodies lying there,” inside the bus. He couldn’t estimate the number who seemed badly injured “but it was more than two or three.”
He couldn’t see the driver.
He said the crash ripped up the front of the bus badly.
Kurtenbach appeared shaken by the experience and was waiting for his daughter to come and take him home. His wife died in March.

tiffiant

The collision tore off the front of the northbound bus. The Via train, a locomotive and four passengers cars, came to a halt about 100 metres west of the collision. The locomotive and one car had derailed.

Train 51 left Ottawa Station at 8:34 bound for Toronto.

Mayor Jim Watson tweeted: “My thoughts are with the victims of this accident. Please pray for those affected and for our 1st responders dealing with this tragedy.”

At Ottawa City Hall, an early-morning transit commission meeting was cancelled.

“It’s bad. It’s really bad,” said Coun. Diane Deans.

Via Rail said they would provide comment later Wednesday morning.

Investigators with the Transportation Safety Board are en route to the scene.

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne posted a message on Twitter: "Thinking of all families affected by horrible accident in Ottawa. Thanks to first responders on the scene."

Tweeted Treasury Board President Tony Clement: "Thoughts and prayers over the OC Transpo and train collision. Awful news."

In the early 2000s, the city had a plan to build an underpass for Woodroffe Avenue and then yet-to-be-built Transitway next to it, to separate traffic from the trains.

The $40-million project, whose cost was to be split among the city, provincial and federal governments, was put on hold in 2003 when it turned out that an unusual kind of rock in the area let water flow too freely into the construction trench. The problem was solvable, city officials said at the time, but it would have cost more money; city council would have had to vote to spend it in 2004 and the other governments would have to be asked to kick in, too.

In 2002, then-mayor Bob Chiarelli described the intersection of tracks and road as “a very, very severe public safety issue.”.

===



Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news ... .html#ixzz2fFvNii78

tiffiant

Emergency crews report ‘multiple fatalities’ in a collision between an OC Transpo bus and a train on the transitway near Woodroffe Avenue and Fallowfield Road Wednesday morning.


Via Rail train and a city bus collided in Ottawa's west end Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2013.




A Via Rail train and a city bus collided in Ottawa's west end Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2013. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Terry Pedwell