San Diego police rushed to Mission Hills Friday morning after an Amtrak Surfliner Train hit a box truck.
The accident was reported just after 9:30 a.m. at Pacific Highway and Washington Street in the uptown San Diego area. The San Diego County Sheriff's Department told NBC 7 no injuries were reported.
Traffic was shut down and diverted in the area, officials said. Amtrak service was temporarily shut down in both directions as well.
Officers from the San Diego Police Department, San Diego Fire-Rescue Department (SDFD) crews and officials from the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System (MTS) all responded to the scene.
The collision caused the box truck to also smash into a fence that runs along the train tracks. The box truck plowed through a cross pole and traffic sign, which wound up wedged between the truck and fence. The truck subsequently struck three other vehicles.
The traffic sign also hit an MTS vehicle parked on the other side of the fence, damaging a window.
NBC 7 spoke with Natalie Fernbaugh, a passenger on the Amtrak train bound for Los Angeles.
She said she was listening to music when, suddenly, the train came to a halt.
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“It stopped really abruptly. We were just all kind of confused,” she explained. "It kind of shook."
Fernbaugh said she and other passengers waited in their seats for 15 minutes or so, until they heard an announcement on the speaker from Amtrak staff. They were notified of the accident, and the subsequent delay of their train trip.
Witness Jasmine Pablo was riding in a car with a friend near the tracks, waiting at a red light behind a line of other cars.
She said it looked like the box truck – at the front of the line – got stuck on the tracks and the oncoming train was unable to avoid hitting it.
As of noon, officials were still investigating and had not yet released further details of what led to the collision.
