'All of a sudden: Smack!' Amtrak cars derailed after train slams truck in Moorpark

An Amtrak train with about 200 people aboard hit a Ventura County water truck in rural Moorpark late Wednesday morning, derailing several cars and sending about 16 people to local hospitals.

Only the driver of the truck was seriously injured, authorities said.

The collision took place around 11:15 a.m. along a dirt farm road north of Highway 118, also called Los Angeles Avenue, near Gabbert Road, at the west end of the city. The site is near Muranaka Farm, county officials said.

The northbound Coast Starlight train had been en route from Los Angeles to Seattle at the time, with its next planned stop in Oxnard. The train had eight cars and two locomotives, county fire officials said. Thirteen crew members were on board.

Amtrak officials said ticket scans showed the train was carrying 198 passengers, while county fire officials tallied 186 passengers based on a count of people getting off the train.

An employee of the county's Public Works Agency had been driving the water truck on a dirt road where a stop sign and advisory sign, but no electronic arms, marked the railroad crossing, said Ventura County Sheriff's Capt. Dean Worthy. The tracks, owned by Union Pacific Railroad, are about 250 yards north of Highway 118 at the crash site.

The driver was taken to the trauma center at Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks. His injuries were serious, officials said Wednesday afternoon, but he was said to be in stable condition.

Three cars on Amtrak's Train 14 derailed, though the cars remained upright, authorities said.

Our live coverage as it happened: Amtrak train derails in Moorpark after collision with county water truck

Fifteen passengers were taken to area hospitals with minor injuries, including scrapes and bruises. One of the them was transported from the Moorpark community center, where passengers had been bused after the derailment to be reunited with family.

By about 5 p.m., most passengers at the center had been picked up by family members or were being bused to Union Station in Los Angeles to continue their travels. Amtrak officials were handling travelers' detours on a case-by-case basis, a spokesperson for the rail agency said.

Tales from the train

At the community center on Moorpark Avenue Wednesday afternoon, some passengers described what it was like on the train.

Kimberly Mathews of Klamath Falls, Oregon, was taking the coastal route home when a sudden jolt threw her across the seat.She stood up to go to the bathroom, she said, and was on the stairs when her car derailed, knocking her down again.

Her back and shoulders hurt. “It feels like somebody took a sledgehammer and just whacked me 50 times,” she said, adding she'd visit her doctor when she gets home.

Tucson residents James Hinz and Theresa Darragh had been on their way to Seattle to catch a cruise ship for Alaska.

“I thought we were goners,” Darragh said. The couple were in the same car as Mathews.

Hinz said the incident took about 30 to 45 seconds from the first jolt to derailment.

Their train car appeared to catch fire and its occupants evacuated, he said. The pair's luggage was in the affected compartment below. County fire officials described putting out a fire, but later said they put water on a spot putting up heavy smoke that may have been from heat or full combustion.

By 4 p.m., Amtrak had arranged a bus back to Union Station in Los Angeles and told Hinz and Darragh they’d get them to Seattle by Friday, a day ahead of their cruise ship's departure.

Birthday interruption

Mindy Faver of Detroit and her mother Sheri Peterson, who lives in Oceanside, had been on a special mother-daughter trip to visit family in Eugene, Oregon. Wednesday was Peterson's birthday.

“All of a sudden: Smack!” Faver recalled. She was seated facing the rear of the train and saw what she later found out was the water truck’s tank tumble past her window.

But with minimal injuries overall, she said, “It could have been a lot worse.”

The incident brought responders from several agencies, including county fire and sheriff's personnel, California Highway Patrol officials, private ambulance crews, rail agency representatives and others.

Sections of Highway 118 were closed at times as authorities stopped traffic periodically to let vehicles out of the staging area and to let people cross the roadway.

Traffic slowed to a crawl as drivers tried to catch a glimpse of the scene between trees and fields of weeds.

At the collision site, a section of the water truck's wheels and rigging remained on the tracks in front of the train's damaged front end, with the train's shattered windows appearing to look over the scene.

Workers tended to derailed cars that tilted toward a nearby hillside. The truck's yellow water tank lay crumpled in a field alongside the tracks.

Amtrak spokesperson Kimberly Woods in a statement said the county water truck had been "obstructing tracks" in Moorpark when it was hit by the northbound train.

"Amtrak, in coordination with local authorities, is conducting a full investigation," Woods said.

This story may be updated.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: 'All of a sudden: Smack!' Train derailed after crash in Moorpark