WESTLAND (WWJ) -- An Amtrak train has crashed into a garbage truck in Westland.
Westland Police confirmed to WWJ Newsradio 950 that an Amtrak passenger train hit a vehicle at around 8:30 a.m. at the Merriman Road railroad crossing, south of Michigan Ave.
Reporting from the scene, WWJ's Luke Sloan said the vehicle hit was a Priority Waste garbage hauler.
"This is a work vehicle, a big work truck carrying two dumpsters, and it's been completely split in half; I mean like a clean break," Sloan said. "And one half of this vehicle, where the front half where the driver would be, is right now sitting on Merriman Road. The other half of the vehicle, the truck, has been dragged down the tracks quite some ways."
A witness on the scene told Sloan that the driver had to be cut out of the truck. He was alive and alert when he was taken to a hospital, but there is no update on his condition at this time.
Nathan Reynolds, who was driving to work, said he was a few cars behind the garbage truck. He said the red lights were activated at the railroad crossing, but the truck driver disregarded that.
Amtrak train crashes into garbage truck in Westland
(Credit: Luke Sloan/WWJ)
"He was about four or five cars back. We see him come up and around. People on this side of the gate, on the opposite side of the gate, were beeping at him telling him no don't do it. They had a better view of the train, where it was at than we did," Reynolds said. "And he still disobeyed that, even though the guardrails were down, and the train horn was beeping. He came up and around and got smacked right in the middle."
"As soon as he got smacked, the truck flipped onto its side; everything burst and caught into flames. And the debris field goes all the way down the tracks," he said.
Reynolds said he and some other bystanders got out of their cars to see if the truck driver was alive. "At first it didn't look like he was breathing. Then they were able to reach their hand into there and like touch him, and he was still alive. He was able to give us his name, his date of birth. And with that, police arrived on the scene."
An Amtrak spokesperson told WWJ that there were 136 passengers plus a crew aboard the train, but no one on the train was hurt. This was Train 351, which operates daily from Pontiac to Chicago.
There was a massive police presence, with both Wayne and Westland officers on the scene, later in the morning.
Merriman Road was shut down in both directions. The City of Westland pushed out a text notification telling residents that that area was going to be closed off for some time.
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