Student charged with DUI after narrowly escaping train crash

Two people, including a university graduate student, narrowly escaped being hit by a train after the student allegedly drove on to train tracks early Wednesday morning.

The student, Jennifer L. Murphy, 23 of Westfield, Mass, was charged with DUI.

Newark Police say an officer patrolling West Main Street around 1 a.m. saw a car turn off the roadway and onto the railroad tracks that run parallel to Elkton Road.

The officer activated his lights and siren to gain the driver’s attention, but was unsuccessful, said police spokesman Lt. Brian Henry. The officer was unable to follow the car as it straddled one of the rails, traveling about 100 feet down the tracks.

The train crossing gates started to activate and the officer heard a train horn blow and saw a train approaching the car head-on, Henry said. The officer ran toward the car and yelled for the occupants to get out.

Murphy and the front passenger both exited the car seconds before the train collided with the vehicle.

Murphy’s blood alcohol content was .220, well over the legal limit of .08, Henry said.

Murphy’s car suffered considerable damage to the front end, but neither she nor the passenger was injured. Neither the train nor the tracks were damaged.

Wednesday’s incident marks the second time in less than a year that a driver narrowly escaped a crash after mistakenly driving onto the train tracks that intersect Main Street. In March, five students and another man pulled an elderly woman out of her car moments before it was struck by a train. That driver was not impaired.
 

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2 comments

Anonymous

Tue Feb 23 2010 04:53

I was there and watched it happen, pretty sure there wasn't time to call that number.

Anonymous

Sat Feb 20 2010 07:37

omg can we please stop talking about those frat boys who pulled the woman out of the car. Maybe if they called the number on the signals, they could have stopped the train and avoided the collision.

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