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Thursday, March 28
The Indiana Daily Student

Freshman student recalls train accident near 10th and Union

A white Audi is stuck by a train at 10th and Union early Monday morning.

He was in his friend’s room on the sixth floor of Eigenmann Hall when he looked out the window.

Within a second, IU freshman Ryan Hobart saw a white Audi inch onto the train tracks near 10th and Union streets.

Within that second, a train struck the driver’s side of the ?vehicle.

Just after midnight Monday morning, a train traveling west collided with a car traveling south on North Union Street.

When Hobart saw the collision from his window, he and his friends sprung into action, ?rushing to the scene.

“From the moment of impact I could tell it was going to be serious,” he said. “It was a strong hit. I knew it needed swift attention.”

Hobart and his friends were the first to arrive on the scene. His friend Stephan Addington approached the vehicle.

They found a young woman laying on her back about two or three feet from the door. Hobart said she was responsive, moaning and complaining of ?abdominal pain.

They couldn’t tell if she was thrown from the vehicle or had gotten out of the vehicle herself.

Addington, a Red Cross First Aid Emergency Care trained responder, conducted back and spinal checks on the woman.

“She was shocked and ?confused,” Hobart said. “She was looking everywhere for her glasses.”

They peered into the car and saw a male, aged approximately 18 to 21 years. The airbags had been deployed and blocked some of what they could see, but Hobart said he could only see a small amount of blood coming from the driver’s mouth. There were no other visible lacerations.

He was breathing heavily and his leg was shaking. Hobart and Addington asked him if he could hear them and asked him to try to move his hands, but he was unresponsive.

Emergency responders arrived at the scene about five minutes after Hobart’s initial call. They placed the female passenger onto a stretcher, loaded her into the ambulance and drove to IU Health Bloomington Hospital.

Two other responders worked to pry the driver’s side door open.

Students and other bystanders gathered on Union Street to watch the scene. The vehicle was about 25 yards from the intersection, and the train was stopped on the tracks about 200 yards away.

Parts of the car lay close to the back of the nearby Village Pantry.

Onlookers watched as responders moved the driver onto a stretcher and the ambulance left five minutes later.

Hobart spoke with police the night of the accident and described what he had seen.

“You don’t see that on an everyday basis,” Hobart said. “I’ve never witnessed a crash like this. I’m just hoping that our quick reaction played a part in assisting him. I hope the time we saved was valuable.”

The last time Hobart saw the driver, he was breathing. He asked an officer about their conditions, and the officer told him they seemed stable.

The driver was airlifted to Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis, said Lt. Brice Teter on Tuesday. His condition at the scene was determined life-threatening, but seems to have improved. The passenger's injuries were not life-threatening and she remains at IU Health Bloomington Hospital, Teter said. 

Teter said the investigation is still ongoing and police are waiting to talk with the driver to determine what happened early Monday morning. 

The day after the accident, Hobart thought about what he saw.

“I’ve been looking at cars outside of the window all day,” he said. “Cars are going quicker than he was going. It’s confusing to everyone who was involved what really happened.”

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