NTSB team arrives in Missouri to investigate Amtrak derailment as death toll rises to 4 - CNN

Approximately 275 passengers and 12 crew members were on board at the time of the crash, Amtrak said in its statement.

"We started feeling the train tilting over to the right.

This is very serious," Dax McDonald, who was on the train with his sister Samantha, told CNN's "New Day."

Their train car had tipped over and was laying on its side.

Samantha McDonald said she looked straight up and saw the windows that offered their only chance for escape.

"I was able to lift myself up, and then there was other passengers that had gotten out before us from the other train cars that were able to help lift me up and our family," she said.

On Sunday, 85 passengers were on board a train in rural California that hit a vehicle.

A release from the Jefferson County coroner says the person in the car drove around downed arms.

Passengers describe escaping from overturned train cars

Jason Drinkard, a high school teacher on board and traveling with students en route to a conference in Chicago, told CNN affiliate KMBC passengers began fleeing as soon as the train skidded to a halt.

He, his wife and others "started evacuating people out of the cars as quick as possible."

His students were shaken up but largely okay, he told KMBC, yet he found passengers in another car were slow to exit and required further first aid.

every car to go off," he said.

Scouts on board helped those in need

Two Boy Scout troops from Appleton, Wisconsin, were on the Amtrak train and assisted people who were hurt, Scott Armstrong, director of national media for Boy Scouts of America, told CNN Monday.

The Scouts on the train are believed to be between 14 and 17 years old, Armstrong said, adding none of them were hurt.