Grovetown resident Jerome McCord heard a thunderous crash and knew immediately what it was. He grabbed his 1-year-old daughter, ran outside his mobile home and saw four derailed train cars 30 yards from his door.
An early-morning two-train wreck in Grovetown today resulted in the derailment of four empty cars and at least one minor injury, police said.
“As soon as I heard it I knew,” Mr. McCord said from the front porch of a neighbor’s home on Hardy Drive with his daughter in his lap. “The trains are always running too fast through here.”
At about 6:20 a.m., a CSX train hit the front of a stationary CSX train near the intersection of Ford and Railroad streets,
said Capt. Gary Owens,of the Grovetown Department of Public Safety.
The crash caused four empty railcars to derail, Capt. Owens said.
CSX spokeswoman Meg Scheu said some of the five crew members involved in the accident were injured, but she would not give a specific number.
“The trains were not carrying anything dangerous, and there were no spills,” Capt. Owens said.
None of the cars on one train, which was stationary on the track, derailed, Ms. Scheu said.
The other train, which was traveling north from Augusta to Camak, Ga., was empty, and four of its cars derailed, Ms. Scheu said.
“The empty train was almost able to stop before reaching the second train,” she said.
One locomotive had minor damage, and CSX workers were cleaning up the wreck, she said. The train blocked Robinson Avenue, a main thoroughfare through Grovetown, for about six hours, but police diverted traffic around the accident onto Katherine Street.
Ms. Scheu said CSX officials are investigating the accident