Accident

An explosion, described as a "freak accident," on an overpass disrupted train service Friday in Strawberry Mansion and sent three people to area hospitals, authorities said. The blast about 5 p.m. on the 3000 block of Cecil B. Moore Avenue, which runs above Amtrak tracks, was likely caused by a "thermic reaction" when an icicle broke off and hit a power line, said Chief Inspector Joseph Sullivan. It left a two-foot hole in the bridge. City police and Amtrak sent bomb-sniffing dogs.

MEXICO CITY - A blast that collapsed the lower floors of a building in the headquarters of Mexico's state-owned oil company, crushing 32 people beneath tons of rubble and injuring 121, is being looked at as an accident although all lines of investigation remain open, the head of Petroleos Mexicanos said Friday. As hundreds of emergency workers dug through the rubble, the company's worst disaster in a decade was fueling debate about the state of Pemex, a vital source of government revenue that is suffering from decades of underinvestment and has been hit by a recent series of accidents that have tarnished its otherwise improving safety record.

A mother and daughter were killed and two others were in critical condition following a two-car accident Thursday afternoon outside the Merchantville School. The collision occurred around 3:40 on Chapel Avenue, said Camden County Prosecutor's Office spokesman Jason Laughlin. He could not say whether the victims - whose ages and identifies were not released Thursday evening - were affiliated with the school, which has about 350 students in pre-K through eighth grade, The male driver and a passenger of the second car were taken to Cooper University Hospital, Laughlin said.

Two people are reported dead and two others injured following the collision of an SUV and a minivan in Merchantville, a small municipality outside Camden in Camden County. The vehicles crashed, about 3:45 p.m., on Chapel Avenue near the Merchantville Elementary School. Police at the scene told 6ABC the two killed were pronounced dead at the scene. Two other victims were rushed to Cooper University Medical Center in Camden. Merchantville police did not immediately respond to calls seeking information about the crash.

Three Philadelphia police officers were injured after two unrelated traffic accidents Sunday morning. In the first accident, an officer in the 14th District was traveling southbound on Musgrave Street toward East Washington Lane in East Germantown. As the officer drove through the green light around 8:10 a.m., police said, an unidentified woman driving a black Honda Civic ran the red light, causing the officer to crash into the Honda's driver's-side door. The officer injured his right knee and was taken to Einstein Medical Center for treatment.

The Delaware River Port Authority paid $10 million to a traffic-accident victim in 2011 in a settlement highlighted this month in an audit of the DRPA. The payment, to a man seriously injured when his pickup was struck by a truck driven by a DRPA employee, was by far the most given out during the period between 2003 and 2012 covered by the audit. The $10 million insurance settlement resulted from a lawsuit brought by Gary Pettet, a 55-year-old cement mason from Berlin, Camden County.

WILKES-BARRE - Some prosecutors and politicians are calling for changes in Pennsylvania laws that they say may encourage drivers to flee the scene of an accident if they have been drinking. Under current law, they say, people convicted of driving under the influence in a fatal accident face a mandatory minimum prison sentence of three years, but those who leave the scene and are caught after alcohol has left their system usually can be charged only with fleeing the scene, which carries a one-year minimum term.

JoAn Gewirtz, 84, of Bala Cynwyd, a retired adolescent and family therapist, died Thursday, Jan. 10, in a traffic accident in Ardmore. The former JoAn Luban was a passenger in a Toyota Corolla traveling east on West Wynnewood Road when it collided with a westbound Toyota Camry, police said. Mrs. Gewirtz was pronounced dead on arrival at Lankenau Hospital, police said. The two drivers were treated for minor injuries at other area hospitals. Wynnewood Road was cordoned off between Lancaster Avenue and Argyle Road for four hours as Lower Merion police investigated.

Lawyers for a Northeast Philadelphia man - charged with the 2010 road-rage killing of a pedestrian who was slow crossing the street in front of his father's SUV - told a Philadelphia jury today the death was an accident Gerald Shaffer Jr. tried to prevent. Defense attorney Coley O. Reynolds said the mortal injuries that killed 54-year-old Mark Wallace occurred when Shaffer, 23, tried to break up a fight between Wallace and Shaffer's father, Gerard "Gerry" Sr., a Philadelphia firefighter.

The death of a Neshaminy High School junior who was struck by a Regional Rail train in Langhorne on New Year's Day was ruled an accident Wednesday. Trevor Newman, 16, of Fairview Avenue, Langhorne, tried to jump out of the way of a Trenton-bound train about 2:20 p.m., but was hit and suffered multiple injuries, authorities said. Newman was pronounced dead at the scene, south of the Langhorne station. It was an accident, Bucks County Coroner Joseph Campbell said pending a toxicology report that could take four to six weeks.