Twenty-six cars of a 93-car eastbound Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train derailed, spreading lumber and other cargo onto the side of the tracks six miles east of Havre Sunday afternoon.

    Burlington Northern Santa Fe spokesman Gus Melonas said the cause of the derailment is under investigation.

    He said one crew member suffered a shoulder injury, and another was taken to Northern Montana Hospital for a non-life-threatening injury.

    Most of the cars at the front of the train were tipped on their sides, observers said.

       Melonas says 1,500 gallons of diesel fuel spilled from one of the locomotives, but the spilling had stopped and there was no expected environmental threat.

    Track was ripped up, and workers from construction companies were summoned to the scene to help clear the mess. It was not known when the track would reopen.

    Lumber and other cargo were strewn over the area between the track and Highway 2.

    It was not known how long the clean-up would take. A westbound Amtrak train had to turn around and return to Malta.

    Montana Highway Patrol officers at first allowed a Havre Daily News photographer to take pictures, but BNSF officials declared the track unsafe and instructed Highway Patrol to order the photographer to leave.

    Highway Patrol officers were the first on the scene because they were issuing a speeding ticket to Donita Demotiney on Highway 2 at the time.

    Demontiney said she was terrified as she sat in the back seat of the trooper car and saw the train derail. The front of the train went off the track first, and then trains behind it followed in rapid order.

    (Associated Press material was used in this report.)