Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. Advertisement At least 18 people have died and 135 have been hurt in a head-on collision between a passenger train and a freight train near Los Angeles. The crash derailed both trains and forced the engine of the passenger train back into one of its coaches. Fire-fighters put out a blaze under one of the carriages and have been cutting through metal to rescue trapped people. The exact cause of the crash - the worst in the US for 15 years - is not yet known. The crash happened at 1632 local time (2332 GMT) on Friday, at a time when the passenger train was carrying 222 people, most of them commuters. The Metrolink passenger train was travelling fromLos Angeles to Moorpark, north-west of the city, a spokeswoman said. It collided with a Union Pacific freight train on a curving stretch of track in Chatsworth, in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles county. 'Total destruction' "That's probably the most serious trainwreck to occur here in a very long time," Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said, according to the AFP news agency. I heard a loud crash and I saw black smoke... some people were mangled pretty bad

Phil Thiele, Metrolink passenger The front coach of the Metrolink passenger train derailed and was crushed by the engine after the collision. Two other coaches of the train remained upright. Aerial images of the crash scene showed teams of rescuers using ladders to reach injured people inside the