A commuter train in New Jersey crashed into Hoboken Terminal on Thursday morning, resulting in multiple injuries, at least one fatality and visible structural damage.
One person standing on the platform was killed by debris from the crash, and at least 108 people were injured in the accident, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey said at a press conference Thursday afternoon. The train "came at a high rate of speed into the station and crashed through all the barriers, bringing it right to the interior wall of the Hoboken terminal," Christie said.
He would not speculate about the cause of the accident, saying it was under investigation. The engineer of the train survived the crash, is in critical condition and is cooperating with authorities, he said.
Christie told MSNBC and CNN shortly before noon Eastern that there was no indication that the crash was anything but an accident.
Joseph Scott, the CEO of Jersey City Medical Center, said the hospital had admitted some victims in critical or serious condition.
The train that crashed originated in Spring Valley, N.Y., and "collided with the platform" at Hoboken Terminal at around 8:45 a.m. Eastern, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York said in a statement.
Passengers told Nessen the train approached the station at "full speed" before slamming into the barrier at the end of the track, with the impact throwing riders onto the floor.
WNYC's Nancy Solomon arrived on the scene shortly after the crash, and says she personally saw 20 to 30 injured people, including at least four who were unable to walk.
She says a train had traveled "all the way into the station — not into the waiting room but into the outdoor part where people transfer."
The station suffered visible structural damage to the historic Beaux-Arts station building, which is more than a century old and was recently renovated. Water was spraying from the damaged areas, and about a fourth of the roof appeared to have collapsed, Solomon tells our Newscast unit.
Solomon spoke to one man who had been a passenger on the train that crashed, in the second car. He said he noticed the train didn't seem to be slowing down enough as it approached the station, and he braced himself for impact.
"People all around him were bloodied," Solomon says. "The train went dark after it crashed. People were screaming, and then they helped each other — there was really no assistance — they helped each other off the train."
Witness Ben Fairclough tells NPR's Morning Edition he, too, talked to people who were inside the train as it crashed.
"They said the train was shaking before it came to an eventual stop and it was moving at a high rate of speed," he says. "There were people climbing out of windows, there was water coming down from the top of the ceiling and there did appear to be folks who were unconscious."
There is no indication of what may have caused the accident. The Federal Railroad Administration has investigators on site, NPR's David Schaper reports. The National Transportation Safety Board is sending a "go team" to the site to investigate the cause of the crash.
NTSB vice chairman Bella Dinh-Zarr said that among other things, the team would look into the possibility that the crash may have been prevented by positive train control, or PTC, a complex system that can automatically slow or stop a train if the engineer misses a signal or a locomotive is traveling too fast.
NPR's Jeff Brady notes that Congress set a 2015 deadline for America's railroads to implement PETC, but that the deadline was extended after industry complaints about cost and delays in approval for necessary radio towers. It's unclear whether the commuter train that crashed Thursday had the technology installed.
"PTC has been one of our priorities — we know that it can prevent accidents," Dinh-Zarr said. "Whether or not it is involved in this accident that is definitely one of the things we will look at carefully."
She also said the NTSB would be comparing this crash to an earlier crash at the same terminal. In 2011, a PATH train hit the bumper at the end of the tracks, causing minor injuries in several dozen passengers. The NTSB "go team" should arrive in Hoboken on Thursday afternoon, she says.
Meanwhile, rail service in and out of Hoboken train station has been suspended, New Jersey Transit and PATH announced. Transit buses and the NY Waterway are accepting rail tickets and passes, and local transit authorities are increasing bus services.
The PATH station at Hoboken appears structurally sound and should be able to reopen, Christie said Thursday, although he didn't say when that would happen. New Jersey Transit service out of Hoboken Terminal is suspended indefinitely.
Hoboken Terminal is a major commuter hub, connecting New Jersey Transit commuter rail to PATH trains into New York City. The station averages more than than 15,000 boardings each weekday on New Jersey Transit, and 28,000 each weekday on PATH.
The terminal was built in 1907, and was renovated between 2004 and 2011, in a project that restored ferry service and rebuilt a long-missing clock tower. The building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
This is a breaking news story. As often happens in situations like these, some information reported early may turn out to be inaccurate. We'll move quickly to correct the record and we'll only point to the best information we have at the time.
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