Train Kills Woman Who Fell Off Metrolink Platform

SYLMAR, CA — Authorities are investigating two fatalities Tuesday involving Metrolink trains, including one crash that killed a 24-year-old woman who fell from a platform in Sylmar.

The woman was struck by Palmdale-bound Metrolink Train 285 just after 6 p.m. Monday at the station in the 12200 block of Frank Modugno Drive, near the border with San Fernando, according to Chris Gutierrez of Metrolink.

The woman had been facing the tracks and at some point turned, slipped, and fell backward from the platform, according to Lt. Paul McLaughlin of the Los Angeles Police Department's Mission Station.

A man witnesses said was the woman's boyfriend jumped onto the tracks and tried to pull her to safety, but she may have been unconscious as the man was only able to move her a short distance before he had to jump out of the way, McLaughlin said.

The woman was pronounced dead at the scene.

The man's leg was struck but he was not seriously injured. He and the woman's mother and twin sister came to the Mission Station to try to find out the woman's condition and if she had been taken to a hospital and were then notified that she had not survived, according to McLaughlin, describing a scene of grief when the notification was made.

The fatality halted train traffic through the station and officials arranged bus bridge service to get passengers to their destinations, Gutierrez said.

Meanwhile in Orange County, one person was killed and another person was injured when they struck by a passenger train in Dana Point.

The victims were in an area closed to pedestrians, Metrolink officials said.

The crash occurred around 4 p.m. Monday involving the Metrolink's OC train 609, which was traveling from Oceanside to Los Angeles, Gutierrez told the Orange County Register.

One person died from the impact, the other person survived but information on that person's condition was not immediately available, Gutierrez said.

Trains were delayed for more than two hours while the incident was investigated and alternative transportation was provided to the train's 64 passengers, the Register reported.

City News Service; (Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)