| Advertisement |
|
|
A woman has died from her injuries after her car was struck by a train Friday morning. It happened near K-15 and 47th Street South at around 11:00.
Drivers are asked to avoid that area while crews clean up the wreckage.
The force of the collision sent the car's engine flying out of the vehicle. It landed several feet away.
Deputies arrived about a minute after the first call. They found a single woman in the damaged Ford Focus, injured. Deputies performed CPR until medics arrived. But she died at the hospital.
"We do have some witnesses and we're collecting witness statements from people who reported having seen the accident," said Capt. Annette Haga, Sedgwick County Sheriff's Office.
Deputies are still looking into if the road conditions were a part of the accident. But, whether they were or not, this isn't the first time that a train has hit a vehicle at this intersection.
"Recently we've had two train accidents," said Stan Swope, who works at U-Save Tire, just across the tracks from the accident. He and his co-workers see a lot of accidents.
It was just a month ago that deputies pulled a man from a wrecked cement truck at the same intersection, moments before it was hit by a train. He was hurt but expected to recover.
"I can tell you that 47th and K15 is one of the higher accident intersections that the Sedgwick County Sheriff's Office investigates accidents at," said Capt. Haga.
Over at U-Save Tire they say the intersection is a busy one. But that's not the problem they see.
"Most of the accidents we've seen up on the intersection are people, after the light turns red, making a left hand turn," said Swope.
They say Sheriff's deputies have been out more than once ticketing drivers.
"People just don't pay attention like they should," said Swope. "A lot of times people will stop on the tracks waiting for the lights to change and people just really don't pay attention."
Deputies are still talking to witnesses to figure out exactly how the accident happened. They have not released the woman's name because they're still notifying her family.