Two teenagers have been injured after the car they were travelling in crashed into the Ghan passenger train near Baroota, about 260 kilometres north of Adelaide yesterday afternoon.
Emergency services were called to a level crossing at Park Road, east of the Augusta Highway, about 3:15pm on Wednesday after a Mazda 3 crashed into the train and rolled.
The car was travelling east when it crashed into the northbound train.
SA Police said two 17-year-old boys, both from Port Augusta, suffered minor injuries and were taken to hospital.
It said no-one on board the train, which travels between Adelaide and Darwin, was injured and the train stopped a short distance away.
The passengers were then able to continue on their journey after the locomotive was swapped.
Eight people arrested after stolen car in Adelaide
In a separate incident, eight people, including six teenagers, were arrested after a car was allegedly stolen overnight, SA Police said.
“I think it would have looked a bit like a clown car,” Senior Constable Kate Dawson told ABC Radio Adelaide.
She said officers were called to a home in Lightsview, in Adelaide’s north-eastern suburbs, about 1:30am this morning after the occupant reported that her house had been broken into and her red Kia Sportage stolen.
About an hour later, police received a report that a red Kia had stolen petrol from a service station on Grange Road at Flinders Park, in Adelaide’s west.
The car was then allegedly sighted by patrols another hour after that on South Road near Anzac Highway.
Senior Constable Dawson said the car was tracked using static traffic cameras and the Traffic Management Centre provided updates on the car’s location to police.
Road spikes were set up near the intersection of South Road and Regency Road and a short time later ran over spikes, shredding the front driver’s side tyre.
“But the car kept travelling north so, about 10 minutes later, about 3:30am, police located the Kia abandoned on the Salisbury Highway where it had crashed into a small wire fence,” Senior Constable Dawson said.
She said police dog Axe tracked the suspects through the wetlands to the Dry Creek Railway Station, and eight males, ranging in ages from 14 to 20, were found.
Police said all eight were arrested and charged with illegal use of a motor vehicle.
The arrests include a 14-year-old Northfield boy, 15-year-old Mansfield Park boy, a 15-year-old Parafield Gardens boy, a 16-year-old Renown Park boy, a 16-year-old Rosewater boy, a 16-year-old Alberton boy, an 18-year-old Christie Downs man and a 20-year-old Brompton man.
In another unrelated incident, a 69-year-old Dudley West man was seriously injured in a single vehicle crash at Pelican Lagoon on Kangaroo Island.
A passing motorist found a ute which had left the road and hit a tree on Hog Bay Road about 4:15am on Thursday.
The injured man was taken to the local hospital before being flown to Adelaide for treatment.
Hog Bay Road was closed but reopened about 6am.
Police investigations into all three unrelated incidents are continuing.
