By DUSTIN RACIOPPI
A Middletown man was struck and killed by a New Jersey Transit train in Little Silver early Wednesday morning, officials said.
NJT Spokesman Joe Dee confirmed that Robert Weiler III, 28, was hit and killed at 12:45a by the North Jersey Coast Line train.
According to Dee, the 11:18p out of New York train was enroute to Long Branch when the train’s engineer saw a man on the tracks. The engineer sounded the horn and applied the train’s emergency brakes, he said.
“He could not stop the train, unfortunately, in time,” Dee said.
It’s not known exactly where on the tracks Weiler was, why he was on the tracks or how fast the train was traveling. Dee also wasn’t sure what hospital Weiler was taken to.
“It is clear to say that the train was traveling when the engineer observed this individual on the tracks at the station,” Dee said.
The accident is under investigation.
Dee said NJT and Little Silver police responded to the accident. Little Silver police deferred all questions to NJT.
Weiler’s death is the first in the Little Silver-Red Bank area of the North Jersey Coastline path this year. It’s the 27th statewide, Dee said.
