The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness

Freight train hits and kills two women on tracks in Maryland

July 19, 2018 at 4:10 p.m. EDT

Two women were struck and killed by a freight train north of Washington on Wednesday night although the train operator saw them on the tracks and reportedly blared the train’s horn and started to apply its brakes, officials said Thursday.

The victims, Cristina Segovia, 30, and Daianne Peralta, 25, were near Waring Station Road and Peach Crest Drive in Germantown shortly before 8:30 p.m., according to the Montgomery County Police Department. Investigators on Thursday were still trying to learn why they had gone onto the tracks.

A westbound CSX train struck them.

Investigators said Segovia lived on West Diamond Avenue in Gaithersburg. They had yet to get a confirmed address for Peralta.

Adults and children alike often underestimate how quickly trains can come upon them when they’re on tracks. “People always think they have time to get away,” Marc Orton, an official at the Norfolk Southern Railway, said in an interview with The Washington Post in 2015.

A CSX spokesman said that “CSX personnel are cooperating with the Montgomery County Police Department, who are investigating the incident. CSX appreciates the swift response by local emergency personnel and extends its thoughts to those impacted by this tragic event.”