Freight train derails near Pittsburgh
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E-mail Xinhua, May 15, 2015
At least 10 train cars derailed Thursday morning near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, less than two days after a deadly derailment of Amtrak train in the state's another city killed at least eight people.
![At least 10 train cars derailed Thursday morning near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, less than two days after a deadly derailment of Amtrak train in the state's another city killed at least eight people. [Photo/Chinanews.com]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20150515/001aa0ba3c1616bf94bc0b.jpg "At least 10 train cars derailed Thursday morning near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, less than two days after a deadly derailment of Amtrak train in the state's another city killed at least eight people. [Photo/Chinanews.com]") |
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At least 10 train cars derailed Thursday morning near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, less than two days after a deadly derailment of Amtrak train in the state's another city killed at least eight people. [Photo/Chinanews.com] |
According to local media report, at least 10 cars of a freight train derailed in the Hazelwood neighborhood outside Pittsburgh around 10 a.m. local time.
So far, there were no immediate reports of injuries, according to a branch of U.S. TV network CBS News in Pittsburgh.
On Tuesday night, an Amtrak train with 238 passengers and five crew members abroad derailed in Philadelphia, killing eight people.
More than 200 people were also injured in the accident.
After studying the data from the train's "black box" recorder, investigators on Wednesday said the Northeast Regional Train 188 was traveling at 106 miles per hour (mph) when it entered a curve, more than double the maximum speed of 50 mph.
The National Transportation Safety Board, the federal agency leading the investigation, said the engineer of Train 188 triggered the emergency brakes just seconds before the crash, but questions remained unclear as to why he didn't slow down the train much earlier and whether he was to blame for the excessive speed.
Meanwhile, Tuesday's accident triggered debates about the budget slash imposed by the Congress on the nation's railway system, which critics say would harm the maintenance of the nation 's transport infrastructure.
Just hours after the Amtrak train derailed in Philadelphia, a Republican-controlled House committee approved a measure on Wednesday that cuts funding for Amtrak by about 15 percent from last year's level.
The measure still needs to clear full House and Senate votes.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Wednesday told CNN that investing more on transport infrastructure should not be a partisan issue.
"There is clearly more than can be done when we're talking about a railway infrastructure that is decades-old," Earnest said. "If there's an opportunity for us to make further investments in our infrastructure that would better safeguard the traveling public, then those are investments that we should make."
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