A Round Lake Beach man has been identified as the driver killed after a freight train struck his landscaping truck in Elgin as investigators say the driver had only seconds’ notice of the incoming train.
The Elgin Police Department and Elgin Fire Department responded around 6:30 a.m. on October 23 to the area of State Street north of Locust Street for a vehicle crash involving a train.
Officers arrived and found a pickup truck with a trailer, which belonged to an Elgin-based landscaping company — Cornerstone Partners Horticultural Services, with three occupants inside the truck.
The pickup truck had been struck by a Union Pacific train at the railroad crossing on State Street, police said.
The driver was pronounced dead at the scene inside the heavily damaged truck. Two truck passengers were hospitalized for injuries.
The Kane County Coroner’s Office identified the driver to Lake and McHenry County Scanner on Monday as Martin Martinez Jimenez, 56, of Round Lake Beach.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) last week released its preliminary report on the crash and the circumstances surrounding it.
The Union Pacific Railroad locomotive was traveling northbound when it struck the Ford F-250 pickup truck, which was southbound on State Street.
Visibility was dark but clear with no precipitation at the time of the crash, the report said. Rail traffic in the area operates at a 30-mph permanent speed restriction.
The crossing was equipped with active warning devices, including flashing lights, bells and gates, on the roadway approaches from both directions.
The train was returning to Union Pacific’s Belvidere Yard in Belvidere after completing work in the Union Pacific Proviso Yard and West Chicago Yard.
The report said the crew, a conductor and an engineer, had been on duty since 8 p.m. the previous day.
Event recorder data showed the train approached the crossing traveling about 27 mph.
A review of the locomotive’s outward-facing image recorder showed roadway traffic traversing the crossing in the seconds before the collision, the report said.
The event and image recorders showed that the train’s whistle sounded for the first time and the crossing’s warning devices activated when the train was near the edge of the crossing.
Federal regulations call for grade crossing warning systems to provide a minimum of 20 seconds of warning.
The truck entered the crossing from the train’s right immediately before the collision and was struck while in motion, the report said.
The train engineer applied the brakes shortly after impact and brought the train to a stop north of the crossing.
The NTSB responded to the scene and their investigation remains ongoing, with future investigative activity focusing on Union Pacific’s operating rules, policies and training.
The investigation will also look at the performance of the train detection technology used by the highway railroad grade crossing’s warning systems.