Train-car crash kills passenger

CHEROKEE - A Mississippi woman was killed and a man injured when the vehicle they were in collided with a train at the West Mill Creek Loop crossing around 2:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Sandra Lominak, 30, of Main Street, Iuka., Miss., was pronounced dead at the scene by Colbert County Coroner Carlton Utley.

She was a passenger in a 2002 Ford Focus driven by Glenn Henry Brown, 43, Tishomingo 956, Iuka. He was flown from the scene to Huntsville Hospital. Hospitals officials said he was in the emergency room late Tuesday. Medical personnel at the scene said his injuries did not appear to be life-threatening.

The vehicle was traveling south on Mill Creek Loop and was struck in the passenger's side door by an eastbound Norfolk Southern train.

The train, which had 24 cargo cars, stopped about a half-mile east of the accident, near East Mill Creek Loop.

The West Mill Creek Loop crossing has flashing lights and crossbars. Witnesses said the car went around the crossbars.

The collision crumpled the car and shoved it off the roadway about 70 feet from the point of impact. The car came to rest on the north side of the tracks.

Initially, authorities believed there was a third person in the vehicle. For nearly two hours, emergency and railroad personnel searched ditches along the sides of the tracks as well as underneath the train and on top.

Authorities said troopers were finally able to speak with Brown at the hospital who said there were only two people in the car.

Tabatha Maxwell said Brown and Lominak had come to check on her father who lives on Mill Creek Loop.

"We were good friends, real good friends," Maxwell said.

Maxwell said Lominak came weekly to see her family.

"The last thing she said when she left out the door was 'I'll see ya'll next time if I make it home,' " Maxwell said.

Lominak is the 31st traffic fatality in northwest Alabama and southern Tennessee this year.

According to statistics, Alabama ranks eighth in the nation in the most train-vehicle collisions and ninth in fatalities.

In 2008, there were 84 train/vehicle crashes that resulted in 10 deaths and 34 injuries in Alabama.

The accident remains under investigation by state troopers at the Quad-Cities post.

Tom Smith can be reached at 740-5757 or tom.smith@TimesDaily.com.

TimesDaily Chief Photographer Matt McKean contributed to this story.