Amtrak train strikes, kills person near downtown Raleigh, police investigate

An Amtrak passenger train struck and killed a person near Garner Road in Raleigh, on Norfolk Southern tracks just south of downtown Raleigh, around 8:03 p.m. Wednesday at Warehouse Drive and Eby Drive.

Raleigh police said the crash happened in a rail corridor that cuts through a busy part of the city where tracks run close to roads and nearby development. Amtrak later confirmed a person was hit by a passenger train, and the victim’s name had not been released as police continued the investigation.

Investigators were still working to determine what the person was doing before the crash and the exact point where the collision occurred. No broader Amtrak service disruption was immediately reported, but any death on an active rail line brings a heavy response from police, rail officials and emergency crews as the scene is secured and evidence is collected.

The fatal collision also puts a spotlight on the larger rail-safety problem Wake County has seen in recent months. Another person was killed in a train-pedestrian crash on Hillsborough Street in west Raleigh on Jan. 16, and a separate Amtrak pedestrian fatality in Garner in late 2025 added to a string of deadly incidents across central North Carolina.

That pattern is part of a larger statewide issue. Operation Lifesaver said preliminary federal data showed 1,314 pedestrian rail trespass casualties nationwide in 2025, including 788 deaths and 526 injuries. Federal Railroad Administration materials warn that trespassing on railroad property is illegal and dangerous, and North Carolina Health News reported in 2024 that North Carolina ranks among the top 15 states for rail trespass deaths.

The North Carolina Railroad Company says its 317-mile corridor runs from Morehead City to Charlotte and that Norfolk Southern operates freight trains while Amtrak runs passenger service on the line. For Wake County, the latest death is another reminder that rail corridors through Raleigh and Garner can turn deadly in seconds, and that the most important unanswered questions are still the basic ones: where the person was, how they got there and what happened in the moments before the train struck.