Service between Jamaica and Penn Station being restored after train hits person, LIRR says
The Long Island Rail Road said service "is being restored" between Jamaica and Penn Station after an "unauthorized" person was struck by a non-passenger work train near Woodside early Tuesday morning.
New York City Transit will stop cross-honoring tickets as of 9 a.m., the railroad said.
The collision, first reported at 5:26 a.m., initially led to the shut down of all service in the City Zone. The LIRR later restored some service in the zone, but said the incident caused many cancellations and disruptions to morning rush-hour service, with passengers diverted onto J/Z and 2/3 subway trains in order to transit between Jamaica and Atlantic Terminal and Penn Station.
Details of the collision were not immediately available. The railroad had said earlier that MTA Police, EMS crews and LIRR personnel responded to the collision site.
It also was not immediately clear how many trains had been affected, but the MTA said at 8:24 a.m. that "customers can anticipate some cancellations and residual delays of up to 20 minutes" on City Zone commutes.
John Valenti, a reporter at Newsday since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press and Society of the Silurians for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing, and is the author of “Swee'pea,” a book about former New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. Valenti is featured in the Emmy Award-winning ESPN 30-for-30 film “Big Shot.”
