VANCOUVER — The family of an elderly couple killed when their car was struck by a train in Langley on Sunday morning are hoping for a quick conclusion to the coroner’s investigation.
“We want answers, because at this point there’s so much speculation out there, that until the investigation is done, we have no answers,” said Kristi Wantke, the couple’s granddaughter. “The hardest thing, apart from losing them, is not knowing.”
Christian Wantke, 90, and Irmgard Wantke, 88, were killed when their vehicle became stuck on the tracks near the Langley Bypass at Glover Road and was struck by a westbound coal train. Both traffic arms were down at the time and their small older-model sedan had somehow become caught in between.
Wantke said the couple had been married for more than 70 years and were totally devoted to each other.
“They had old-school values that if you make a commitment to someone, you stick with that commitment,” said Wantke, who is pregnant and due in February. “You go through the hard times, you go through the good times, you don’t ever give up and you get stronger together. You love each other always.”
The couple had four sons — two of whom are deceased — seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Most of the family lives in the Lower Mainland.
Wantke said her grandparents were young at heart and on the way to a doctor’s appointment when their vehicle was struck.
“They were special people,” she said. “They were going to be 91 and 89 within the next few months and you would never know it. When you hear somebody is 90, there’s this image and they weren’t that. My grandpa loved shopping. He would go store to store. They had old-school values for everything and family was the most important thing.”
The sedan the pair was in was pushed hundreds of metres down the track before the fully laden locomotive was able to come to a stop, according to the Langley RCMP.
The B.C. Coroners Service is investigating the incident, as well as the RCMP’s Integrated Collision and Analysis and Reconstruction Service, CN Rail and Canadian Pacific Railway.
There were several witnesses to the tragedy, and the driver of the locomotive will be interviewed.
Wantke said the family was also hoping to get a message of thanks to the witnesses, one of whom the family believed tried to warn her grandparents that they were in danger.
“We understand it must have been extremely traumatic for them, but we are very grateful and we feel horrible that they had to witness something like that,” she said.
According to a 2014 B.C. Coroners Service report, it takes on average 209 days to complete an accident investigation.
