Officials: Worker fatally struck by LIRR train near Queens Village

A Long Island Rail Road employee died Saturday after being struck on the tracks near the Queens Village station, authorities said.

Soon after the incident, the National Transportation Safety Board tweeted that it was sending a team “to investigate a LIRR employee fatality accident that occurred.”

LIRR spokesman Aaron Donavan said he did not yet have information on the victim.

The 9:36 a.m. LIRR train from Huntington, due into Penn Station at 10:39 a.m., fatally the struck the person west of the Queens Village station at 10:28 a.m., Donovan said.

For several hours on Saturday, trains on the Ronkonkoma, Port Jefferson, Oyster Bay and Hempstead branches were canceled or delayed. By 4:47 p.m., they were back to “operating on or close to schedule,” the LIRR said in a service alert.

A Newsday reporter in the first car of the westbound train from Huntington heard a crash, then felt the train come to a halt. An engineer was heard on the phone saying, “Oh my God,” followed by an announcement on the train that a pedestrian had been hit.

An LIRR worker from Lake Ronkonkoma was killed near Queens Village in August 2012 when he touched the electrified third rail.

The worker had been performing track maintenance with several co-workers at the time.

Earlier this week, the railroad announced enhanced service on the Hempstead Branch for the Belmont Stakes, being run Saturday at the Elmont track.

With Corin Hirsch and Khristopher J. Brooks

By John Asbury

john.asbury@newsday.com,david.olson@newsday.comJohnAsbury,

John Asbury is a breaking news and general assignment reporter. He has been with Newsday since 2014 and previously worked at The Press-Enterprise in Riverside, California.