Amtrak Train Strikes Truck En Route To Chicago, Less Than A Month After Deadly Derailment

An Amtrak train struck a tractor-trailer in northern Illinois on Friday afternoon. The train was headed from San Antonio to Chicago when it collided with the truck near the city of Wilmington. No injuries were reported. Amtrak train 22 was stopped and police were heading to investigate the accident, Chicago news station WLS-TV reported.

This is a developing story.

The accident occurred less than a month after an Amtrak train careened off the tracks while entering a turn near Philadelphia’s Port Richmond neighborhood at 107 miles per hour – over twice the speed limit. The May 12 derailment killed at least eight people and injured more than 200 others. Train engineer Brandon Bastion told federal investigators he had no memory of the derailment. The National Transportation Safety Board is still investigating the reason for the accident, which caused an estimated $9.2 million in damage to the train.

Amtrak said last week it will equip its locomotive cabs with inward-facing cameras that will record the actions of the trains' engineers and aid investigators in the event of an accident. Amtrak’s trains currently have outward-facing cameras and black boxes but there is no equipment monitoring the people who drive the trains.