A train wreck in Irving on Monday morning left one person injured and many commuters late for work. A Trinity Rail Express train hit a pick-up truck around 9:45am near Gilbert and Rock Island in Irving.
"It shook me up. I never thought I'd see anything like this," said eyewitness Cliff Randle. "The train was just blowing his horns like crazy trying to get the guy to move, and it didn't happen."
Randle said it appeared as though the driver of the vehicle purposely stopped on the tracks. He says the car was there for at least a few seconds before the train hit it.
"The arm heads started coming down, and so he pulled underneath the arm parked in the middle of the track and the arm on the north side of the track went up, but he would not move. He just stayed there and so I watched the train hit him. The train had almost completely slowed down to the point where he probably only traveled 40 or 50 feet after he hit the vehicle," said Randle.
The driver of the truck suffered injuries and had to be rushed to the hospital, but she is expected to be okay.
"The trains have the right of way. The key is to be watching for the trains and never park on the tracks," said DART spokesman Mark Ball.
Ball said there were riders in the train at the time of the crash but no one was injured. He added that all crossings have crossing arms and the train was slowing down at the time of impact.
"The reality is if there is a vehicle in front of him as he's trying to slow down, he's probably going to hit it. It takes a lot of time for these trains to come to a complete stop," he said.
Trains were delayed for several hours, but were back on schedule early Monday afternoon. Ball said there have been 14 fatalities so far on the TRE since 1998.
