HEAVY HEART

Vacationing Sisters Among Four Victims Identified in Missouri Amtrak Derailment

Rochelle Cook and Kim Holsapple died when an entire Amtrak train toppled after crashing into a dump truck and derailing.

Missouri Highway Patrol officials released the identities of the four people who died in the Chariton County Amtrak crash Monday, including the dump truck driver who was sitting in the train’s path. The train passengers who died were identified as 57-year-old Rochelle Cook and 56-year-old Kim Holsapple, both from Desoto, Kansas, and 82-year-old Binh Pham from Kansas City, Missouri. Cook and Holsapple were sisters on a four-day getaway to Chicago, their first trip together in many years, the family wrote in a GoFundMe. (The family spelled Holsapple’s name as Rachelle, not Rochelle, in the fundraiser.) The daughter of one of the sisters told KSHB 41 News that she was also aboard the train with her mother and aunt but survived. The truck driver, who died at the scene, was identified as Billy Barton II, 54, from Brookfield, Mo. The National Transportation Safety Board is continuing to investigate the deadly crash that derailed the train, injuring about 150 others.