The call comes as Mandy Horvath, who was hit by a coal train in Nebraska at the weekend, remains in a critical condition in hospital.

The Indiana Rail Road incident happened on July 10 on the company’s viaduct spanning an inlet of Lake Lemon 16km northeast of Bloomington, Indiana.

The 12,700 tonne train, travelling at about 48 kilometres per hour, rounded a bend when the engineer in the lead locomotive saw the two women on the middle of the bridge, known as Shuffle Creek Trestle.

The engineer followed all the appropriate protocols, applying an emergency brake and repeatedly sounding the horn.

However, 12,700t of train takes a lot of stopping. As the two women ran towards the opposite end of the bridge the engineer could do little more.

The locomotive, like nearly every other locomotive in North America, is equipped with video and the footage makes for sobering viewing.

It shows the train closing on the two women who were desperately running along the 24m high bridge.

The footage shows that with more than 30m to go to the end of the bridge one of the women slammed her body onto the ties between the rails.

The other veered to the left and nearly fell off the bridge before also diving between the rails.

By the time the train came to a stop the locomotives were off the bridge. They had completely passed the point where the subjects stopped running.

The engineer assumed he had just killed two people.

The Monroe County Sheriff’s Department was alerted.

Miraculously the two women survived. They escaped to a nearby vehicle and fled the scene.

Indiana Rail Road Company founder, president and CEO Tom Hoback said the incident at Lake Lemon was one of the most glaring examples of people not taking the consequences of trespassing on railroad-owned property seriously that he had seen in 40 years in the business.

“In this case, not only did the two trespassers narrowly escape a horrible death but had the heavy train derailed due to the emergency brake application – which isn’t uncommon – it could have taken down the bridge, possibly killing the engineer as well.

“The human, environmental and financial toll would have been enormous.”

The two women have been identified by local law enforcement and it has become a criminal matter.