Freight locomotive runs off tracks, flattens garage at home in Niagara Falls

NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. — A freight locomotive ran off the end of its track and smashed into the side of a garage Monday at a home in the city of Niagara Falls.

No one was injured, but the impact flattened the brick two-car garage, which had survived a previous train derailment decades earlier.

“The whole house shook,” Lori Morreale Harris, who lives in the house, told The Buffalo News. She said the same garage was struck by a train in the late 1970s when her grandparents lived in the home.

The detached garage sits just a few feet from the end of a short rail spur at a CSX Transportation rail yard. Only a small, metal bumper and two chain-link fences and a narrow, unpaved alley, separate the end of the tracks from Harr's garage.

Photos from the scene showed the blue engine up against the side of the collapsed garage.

Some of the engine's diesel fuel spilled during the collision, but it was contained and did not impact any waterways, CSX said in an emailed statement. The rail company said state and local authorities, along with the Environmental Protection Agency, were notified.

“Our primary focus right now is the health and safety of onsite staff and personnel, the surrounding community, and mitigating risk to the environment,” the CSX statement said.

It said the cause of the derailment was under investigation.