Last night, an Amtrak train passing through Philadelphia jumped the tracks and flipped several of its cars, killing at least six passengers and injuring more than 200. Passengers say that before the crash, the train started shaking while approaching a turn in the tracks, then quickly stopped. It’s not clear exactly what caused the crash. At a press conference, the mayor of Philadelphia said officials were investigating what happened. “It’s an absolute, disastrous mess. I’ve never seen anything like this before in my life,” he said. “The train’s seven cars, including the engine, are in various stages of disarray—turned over, upside down, on their side.” The black box data from the train has been sent to Amtrak’s operations center in Delaware to get more information about what took place. Some of the train’s 238 passenger’s have not yet been accounted for, but crews are still searching through the wreck …
Update: The death toll from the accident has risen to seven, and information from the train’s black box shows that the train was traveling more than 100 mph before it derailed.
