Three Amtrak Victims Identified

The names of the three people killed when their car was struck by an Amtrak train in Toccoa Friday night have now been released.

Late Monday, authorities in Stephens County identified as 22-year-old Areale Leigh Nunn of Austell, Georgia, 23-year-old Erich Boecklbauer of Austell and 20-year-old Crystal Crews of Kennesaw.

The collision occurred at about 9:45 p.m. Friday at a railroad crossing on Grant Smith Road, near the Summit subdivision.

According to Stephens County Sheriff Randy Shirley, the three were headed to Toccoa to visit friends and were killed when the Amtrak Crescent train heading northbound into Toccoa struck their 2008 Mazda broadside.

The impact pushed the vehicle end over end some 300 feet down the tracks until it eventually landed upside down in a ditch and burst into flames.    All three victims died at the scene.   No passengers on the train were injured.

Meantime, authorities in Alabama are investigating another Amtrak wreck on Sunday near Birmingham in which a mother and child were killed.

Amtrak spokesman Craig Schulz said the train, the Crescent, was traveling from New York and New Orleans, when it struck a vehicle crossing the tracks Sunday afternoon in Jefferson County, Alabama.

Authorities in Jefferson County say 40-year-old Consuelo Laverne Gurley and her 12-year-old son, Micheal Shereff Earskin Jr., died shortly after the crash.