Pregnant woman on Hoboken train: “I thought that we were going to die”
HOBOKEN -- The New Jersey medical examiner identified the woman killed on the platform in the Hoboken train crash as 34-year-old Fabiola Bittar de Kroon. She was an attorney and has a young child.
Scores of others were injured in the crash Thursday.
First responders quickly arrived to treat more than 100 injures, sending at least 74 bloodied and dazed commuters to area hospitals -- many of them by bus.
Alexis Valley is five-months pregnant. She was sitting in the first car and suffered a head injury during the crash.
“I thought that we were going to die,” she said. “I didn’t think we were going to get out.”
David Mielach was also on the train and narrowly escaped after the ceiling collapsed. He tried to help people afterwards.
“We tried to clear the way for the people that were bleeding more to get out first,” he said.
A passenger on the platform shot video of the aftermath. Witnesses said many who were waiting for a train were badly hurt.
“There were definitely some bad injuries,” one of the victims said.
One woman said she is afraid to get back on the train.
At Hoboken University Medical Center chief medical officer Dr. Meika Roberson said most of the injuries were non-life threatening.
“We received 22 patients from the accident, bumps, bruises, some walking wounded, some lacerations and fractures as well,” she said.
At Jersey City Medical Center -- a regional trauma center -- 13 patients remain in guarded conditions.