A 70 year old man in West Chester Township OH near Cincinnati died on Aug. 24 in a rail road crossing accident.
The driver was crossing the railroad track when his SUV was struck at high speed by a train.
There were witness reports that stated that the crossing gates may not have come down in time. West Chester Township police are investigating whether the gates were working properly. Another witness stated that he did not hear the train blow its horn or whistle.
Our View
It is not unusual for safety gates to malfunction; either they stay up entirely or they drop too late. We have even seen gates come down too late and trap a car on the tracks. If the safety gates did indeed malfunction in this train accident tragedy, the family of the deceased should talk to a personal injury attorney.
Our railroad crossing accident lawyers have represented clients who were injured at railroad crossings. In this Virginia case a few years ago, our client’s car was hit by a freight train, which left his two children in the back seat with skull fractures and other injuries.
Our train accident attorneys from Virginia investigated the accident scene and took careful measurements and photos. We also looked carefully at the trees, brush and vegetation, because the car driver stated that he was not able to see the train until the last moment.
We also looked at VA common law, the jury instructions that would be given at trial and we demanded settlement from the insurance company of the driver and also from Norfolk Southern. The settlement helped the children to recover from their injuries.