Metrolink commuter train crash

Several rail cars derailed in the head-on collision and firefighters initially battled a ferocious blaze in part of the wreckage. Of those killed in the accident, authorities said, one is believed to be the Metrolink engineer and another is a Los Angeles Police Department officer.  (Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times)

An injured passenger is lifted out of a mangled Metrolink train car. Firefighters swarmed on top of the passenger cars and used their hands, hand tools and power tools to pry them open. Others made their way through the cars looking for victims.  (Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times)

The Union Pacific freight train and the Metrolink commuter train collided with such force that the lead passenger car was wrapped around the Metrolink locomotive.   (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

Emergency personnel care for injured passengers in a triage area. “The injuries are crushing,” said Los Angeles Fire Department Capt. John Virant, whose Chatsworth-based crew was among the first to arrive.  (Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times)

Rescue workers assist a woman with a head wound. In the initial response, emergency responders smashed windows on the wrecked Metrolink passenger car to reach those trapped inside. Many passengers were carried out on stretchers and backboards.  (Brian Vander Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Emergency workers search for survivors after the deadly train wreck, which occurred on a steep curve of track near Stoney Point Park, just east of Topanga Canyon Boulevard and about a quarter-mile south of the 118 Freeway.  (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

Rescue workers care for victims at a triage center at Stoney Point Park. Many of the more than 135 injured passengers were carried out on stretchers and backboards.  (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times)

Police officers and rescue personnel salute as the body of a Los Angeles Police Department officer, Spree DeSha, 35, is removed late Friday from the wreckage of a Metrolink commuter train. DeSha was on her way home from work when the train collided with a Union Pacific freight train in Chatsworth. The death toll would rise to at least 18 by Saturday morning.  (Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times)

Crews had to contend with fires burning in the wreckage.  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

Rescue workers recover a body from the wreckage early Saturday morning.  (Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times)

Richard Patterson of Los Angeles views a memorial card attached to one of several bouquets of flowers memorialzing the Metrolink 111 victims Sunday.  (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Flowers are left at the Moorpark Metrolink station with a chalk-written note reading, “Bye Chris, your Metrolink buddy.”  (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times)

National Transportation Safety Board contractors help with the investigation Sunday of the switch station where two tracks merge into one to determine the cause of Friday’s Metrolink 111 collision in Chatsworth.  (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

A firefighter views Metrolink 111 debris as crews from different agencies comb through the wreckage to determine the cause of the crash.  (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

A Metrolink train and a freight train are used to reenact Friday’s deadly collision. Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board were doing a “site distance survey” to determine at what point the engineers on the ill-fated trains first saw each other.  (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

Metrolink’s train 111 crosses Chatsworth Street just before the site where at least 25 people were killed and 135 were injured in a head-on collision with a Union Pacific freight train.  (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)

Sonja Salinas brings flowers close to the site of the crash between a Metrolink train and a freight train in Chatsworth.  (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)