Train cars were strewn along several hundred yards of railroad track parallel to Geneva-McKinney Road in McKinney after a Norfolk Southern train left the tracks. (Photo by Michael Broihier)
Around 1 p.m. Monday a southbound Norfolk-Southern train left the tracks parallel to the Geneva- McKinney Road in McKinney, spilling an estimated 40 cars onto the embankment and piling several on top of each other. No one was injured in the wreck, but frustrations were high on the scene as Norfolk-Southern representatives would not produce the conductor with a manifest of what was onboard. At one point Norfolk-Southern officials told Lincoln County Emergency Manager Don Gilliam that they would be “back in five minutes” with a manifest and disappeared for over an hour and a half.
No one was forced to evacuate their homes along the rail bed, but emergency workers kept a close eye on the wreckage for smoke; shortly after the incident the engineer told a firefighter that five cars might have some hazardous materials onboard but he didn’t know what they were. Geneva-McKinney Road was still shut down as of 4 p.m. Monday as officials sought to determine what exactly was being hauled on the train.
Susan Terpay, a Norfolk-Southern corporate communications officer, said that the crew should have been able to produce a bill of lading to the incident commander and could not explain the delay until she gathered more information.
A Norfolk-Southern railroad construction crew from Nashville is expected to be on scene around 6:30 p.m. to begin clearing the wreckage from the tracks.
