
A 20-year-old U.S. Naval Academy student heading home on leave, a 48-year-old father-of-two, a prominent New York City college dean, a tech CEO with a two-year-old child and a beloved Wells Fargo senior vice president were among the passengers killed in the Amtrak crash, it has emerged.

Justin Zemser, an only child, was traveling home from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland to Rockaway Beach, New York to see his mother when the train came off the tracks at Frankford Junction near Philadelphia just before 9.30pm on Tuesday evening, killing at least eight people.

Jim Gaines, who designed video software for the Associated Press, was also named among the victims. He had been attending meetings in Washington and was heading home to Plainsboro, New Jersey at the time of the crash, his wife, Jacqueline, said. They have two children, aged 11 and 16.

Abid Gilani, 55, a senior vice president in the hospitality finance group at Wells Fargo based in New York City was also one of the victims in the crash.

Rachel Jacobs, a 39-year-old tech CEO and married mother from New York City with a two -year-old was confirmed as dead by a family member on Wednesday evening. She had texted her husband to say she was on Train 188 just minutes ahead of the crash.

Derrick Griffith, 42, the Dean of students at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn and a prominent educator, was killed in the crash as well.

On Thursday, authorities said they had found an eighth body and family said it belonged to Bob Gildersleeve, a 45-year-old businessman who was traveling from Baltimore to New York. His family had previously pleaded for information after he could not be found.

Loss: Justin Zemser, pictured left, and Jim Gaines, right, have been named as among the victims of Tuesday night's Amtrak rail crash

Heartbreaking: Abid Gilani (left) was the third confirmed victim in the crash, while Brandon Bostian (right) has been identified as the engineer who was driving at the time of the crash

Gone too soon: Derrick Griffith (above), a dean at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn, was killed in the crash

Tragedy: Bob Gildersleeve, left, was identified by family as the final victim who was found on Thursday. Rachel Jacobs, pictured right with her husband and their two year old, was confirmed as dead Wednesday night. She had texted her husband on Tuesday evening

Clearing out: Crews began taking away the wreckage of the train Wednesday evening outside Philadelphia

Devastating: An aerial view taken on Wednesday morning shows the Amtrak train that derailed in Philadelphia as it traveled from Washington D.C. to New York on Tuesday evening. Seven people have been confirmed dead, with hundreds more injured

Fears: Search teams are looking to see if anyone is inside the overturned cars, including one which was completely destroyed

Repairs: On Thursday, a flat bed truck hauls a section of new railroad track to the site of Tuesday's deadly train derailment

Clean up: New sections of track is carried in to Frankford Junction on Thursday as investigators remain at the scene

The train was traveling at 106 mph when the engineer applied the emergency brakes as it entered a steep curve, where the speed limit is 50 mph, Robert Sumwalt of the National Transportation Safety Board told reporters on Wednesday afternoon.

The last recorded speed before the data cut out was 102 mph, he added.

NBC News identified the engineer driving the train as Brandon Bostian, 32, of New York City, who has hired a lawyer and refused to speak with detectives.

The announcement came after the Associated Press analysed video of the train and discovered it was traveling at 107 mph as it approached a curve in the tracks, where the speed limit drops from 80 mph to 50 mph.

WHAT IS POSITIVE TRAIN CONTROL? The commuter rail route where an Amtrak train left the track on Tuesday was not using a potentially life-saving braking technology. Known as positive train control (PTC), the technology automatically slows or even halts trains that are moving too fast or heading into a danger zone. It can override a train conductor who is exceeding speed, and under current law, the rail industry must adopt the technology by year end. PTC works by using a global positioning satellite to pinpoint trains. The idea is that it can do this with enough accuracy to allow them to run closer together. It sends real-time visual and audible information to train crew members about locations where the train needs to be slowed or stopped. Among other things, it takes into account approaching signals, speed limits, curves in the track, construction work and the position of approaching switches. PTC then communicates with the train's onboard computer to audibly warn conductors if they are approaching danger. A display shows the train's safe braking distance based on its speed, length, width, weight, and curvature of the track. If a response is not provided by the train engineers in ample time, the computer remotely activates the brakes and stops the train. While this automatic braking system has been available since 1990, the technology remains widely unused. Positive train control was one 10 items on the National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) Most Wanted List last year. Positive Train Control Advertisement

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter responded to the National Transportation Safety Board briefing on Wednesday evening by saying that it proved 'reckless driving by the engineer' in an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN.

He went on to say there was no excuse for the train to be going this speed unless the engineer had a 'heart attack.' Sumwalt responded by calling these comments 'inflammatory' and 'unnecessary.'

On Wednesday morning, the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland confirmed that one of their students was among the fatalities.

'The Naval Academy is deeply saddened to report that a midshipman was named as one of the passengers who lost their life in the AMTRAK train which crashed in north Philadelphia,' it said in a statement.

Justin's mother, Susan Zemser, confirmed his name to ABC News and said he was just finishing his second year at the academy. His body was released to his family, who are Jewish, without an autopsy, the Yeshiva World News reported.

On Wednesday, his devastated parents spoke outside their home.

'He was supposed to come last night at 10:30,' Susan Zemser said of her son as she stood beside her husband Howie. 'When I went online to see, you know, if everything was on time, it said there was a derailment and then it was all plastered on TV.

'All night we kept on calling hospitals for nothing and then we got the phone call this morning that my son had passed.'

She remembered her son as a top student who had been high school valedictorian.

'He was wonderful,' she went on. 'He was absolutely wonderful. Everybody looked up to my son. And there's just no other words I could say.'

Zemser had also previously been an intern for City Councilman Eric Ulrich, a Queens Republican, the New York Daily News reported.

'Justin was truly a bright, talented and patriotic young man,' Ulrich said in a statement. 'He will be sorely missed by all who knew and loved him.'

The Associated Press reported that the second victim, Jim Gaines, joined the AP in 1998 and led the agency's video initiatives.

He won AP's 'Geek of the Month' award in May 2012 for his 'tireless dedication and contagious passion' to technological innovation, the company said.

Jacobs was recently hired as the CEO of online learning tech start-up ApprenNet.

She commuted to Philadelphia, where the team is based, twice a week from her home in Manhattan's Lower East Side, she said in a recent interview.

Around 8.45pm on Tuesday, she texted her husband to say that she was on the train heading back to New York. They have a two-year-old child.

'We called, texted and emailed her right when crash happened, because we knew she was on the train,' ApprenNet COO Emily Foote told PhillyMag. 'I went to the hospitals last night and she wasn't in any of them. I went to the churches and schools where people are being sheltered, and we still can't find her.'

After friends and family learned of her death they released a statement saying; 'This is an unthinkable tragedy. Rachel was a wonderful mother, daughter, sister, wife and friend.

'She was devoted to her family, her community and the pursuit of social justice. We cannot imagine life without her. We respectfully ask for privacy so that we can begin the process of grieving.'

She was the daughter of Gilda Jacobs, CEO of the League for Public Policy and a former Michigan state Senator.

Griffith previously served as executive director of Groundwork before he joined the staff at CUNY, an organization that helps public housing residents attend college.

CUNY in a statement said he performed his job 'with passion' and that he was 'a champion for the downtrodden.'

On Thursday, authorities said a cadaver dog had located an eighth victim among the wreckage and family members said it belonged to Bob Gilersleeve, a 45-year-old father of two and vice president of sales at Ecolab. He had been missing since he got on the train to head to New York for business.

Appeal: The 13-year-old son of missing businessman Bob Gildersleeve held up his dad's photo as he appealed for help finding him

Sadness: Susan Zemser, center, and Howard Zemser, left, the parents of U.S. Naval Academy Midshipman Justin Zemser, prepare to speak to the press outside their home in Rockaway Beach, New York on Wednesday. Their son was heading to see them when he died

Stuck: The Amtrak information board shows the Washington-bound train from New York as cancelled on Thursday

Probe: NTSB investigators can be seen surveying the debris at the scene on Wednesday as they investigate the cause

Crash: On Wednesday morning, crews can be seen investigating the scene of the derailment in the Frankfort section of Philadelphia

Horror: Investigators are looking into whether speed, a curve in the tracks or driver error contributed to the deadly crash

Search: Investigators examine the scene on Wednesday; they are looking at whether speed, equipment or the tracks played a role

At a Wednesday press conference, authorities said that they have recovered the train's black box from the wreckage and it has been taken to the Amtrak operations center in Delaware for analysis.

It has also emerged that the rail route was not governed by an advanced safety technology meant to prevent high-speed derailments.

Officials familiar with the investigation told Reuters that it had not yet been fitted with positive train control (PTC), which automatically slows or even halts trains that are moving too fast or heading into a danger zone. Under current law, the rail industry must adopt the technology by the end of the year.

Amtrak has begun installing components of a PTC system but the network is not yet functioning, federal officials said.

Had the system been in place, 'the accident would not have occurred', Sumwalt said at the press conference.

Mayor Nutter would not comment on the lack of a PTC system, saying that was a discussion for another time and now people should be mourning the victims rather than discussing policy.

Bostian's lawyer told ABC he 'only remembers driving the train to the crash area generally, then later getting tossed around, coming to, finding his bag and his cell phone, and dialing 911.'

The train derailed near a point where an 80 mph straight section turns into a 50 mph curve, but officials said they do not yet know whether the curve or the speed the train was to blame.

Investigators from the NTSB will be looking at factors including the track, speed, equipment, human performance and signals, board member Robert Sumwalt said at the press conference.

But 'the search and recovery attempt will take precedent over our investigation,' he said.

The train's engineer was injured in the crash but it has emerged that he declined to give a statement to investigators.

A family assistance center has been set up near the crash site and authorities are beginning the long process of matching up Amtrak's passenger records with the lists of people who were admitted to hospitals, the mayor said. Some of those people have not yet been identified.

Looking at the scene, 'it is amazing that so many people survived,' the mayor said. 'I saw people literally walking off that train last night and I don't know how they did it.'

Update: At the press conference, the mayor confirmed that more than 200 people had been taken to hospital for treatment

Cancellations: A board in Washington D.C.'s Union Station shows a number of cancelled trains following the crash

Quiet: An almost empty boarding area is seen at the usually-bustling Union Station in Washington D.C. due to the cancelled trains

Alternate route: Passengers in Washington D.C. board a bus for New York after the derailment shut down a critical section of the railroad

Location: A map shows how the train had left Philadelphia and crashed at a bend in Port Richmond on its way to New York City

Amtrak said the train, which was traveling from Washington D.C. to New York, was carrying 238 passengers when the train derailed, ripping some cars apart, sending a total of seven off the tracks and destroying the engine.

Footage of the harrowing aftermath was posted to Instagram by Questlove's producer Yameen Allworld, who was aboard the train, and revealed the terrified cries and sobs of passengers scrambling to leave the cars. In the video, passengers can be seen clambered over to help each other escape the overturned carriage while rescuers rush to their aid.

REPEAT WRECKAGE: CRASH IS JUST THE LATEST MAJOR ACCIDENT ON AMERICA'S BUSIEST ROUTE Tuesday night's wreck unfolded on the Northeast Corridor line, a stretch of track that has long been part of the busiest railroad in America and passes through cities that have seen a number of disasters. In April, on the same stretch of track, a young woman was struck by a train after driving her car onto tracks in Rhode Island. No one on the train was injured. In February, a mother from Westchester, New York, became stuck on Metro North tracks in Valhalla and caused a crash that killed six and injured more than a dozen others. America's train system has also seen recent tragedies outside of the Northeast, with an Amtrak train in Amite, Louisiana, killing a truck driver when it ran into his vehicle on Sunday. In March, an Amtrak train in North Carolina hit a tractor-trailer and flipped over, leaving 55 train passengers injured. While Amtrak and Metro North have seen recent incidents claim passengers' lives, the last Amtrak incident on the Northeast Corridor to reach the destructive scale of Tuesday's crash was a 1987 crash that killed 16. One of the worst passenger train collisiosn in Amtrak's history occurred in 1993 on the cross-country route from Miami to Los Angeles when 47 people died and more than 100 were injured in 'the Big Bayou Canot' crash. Tuesday;s disaster came on the same curve as one of America's deadliest train crashes, a 1943 accident that killed 79. The train, the Congressional Limited, careened off the tracks after the wheels of an older car that had been added to fit more travelers started to overheat and spark, before its axle fell off. Advertisement

As many as 200 people went to hospitals to be evaluated or treated, the mayor said on Wednesday, and as many as eight were critically injured, CNN reported.

Herb Cushing, the medical director for Temple University Hospital, the closest trauma center to the crash site, said at a Wednesday press conference that 23 patients remain at the hospital and that many passengers' injuries - mostly leg, arm and rib fractures - had been caused when other passengers or objects fell on them, or when they were thrown through the air.

Of the eight people who are still in critical condition at the hospital, he said he expects all to survive.

None of the patients were children, he said, and the patients include people from Albania, India, Belgium, Germany and Spain.

Most of the people who were able to speak when they arrived at the hospital had been sitting at the back of the train, suggesting to Dr Cushing that the passengers who suffered the worst injuries had been at the front.

'I was surprised there were as few head injuries that we saw,' he told reporters. 'I think we're fortunate that there wen't more deaths. What little [news coverage] I've seen suggested things could have been a lot worse.'

The mayor described the scene of devastation following the crash on Tuesday night. He said all seven train cars, including the engine, were in 'various stages of disarray'.

He said there were cars that were 'completely overturned, on their side, ripped apart.'

'It is an absolute disastrous mess,' he said. 'I've never seen anything like this in my life.

'It is a devastating scene down there. We walked the entire length of the train area, and the engine completely separated from the rest of the train, and one of the cars is perpendicular to the rest of the cars. It's unbelievable.'

The front of the train was going into a turn when it started to shake before coming to a sudden stop.

An Associated Press manager, Paul Cheung, was on the train and said he was watching Netflix when 'the train started to decelerate, like someone had slammed the brake.'

'Then suddenly you could see everything starting to shake,' he said. 'You could see people's stuff flying over me.'

Cheung said another passenger urged him to escape from the back of his car, which he did. He said he saw passengers trying to escape through the windows of cars tipped on their sides.

'The front of the train is really mangled,' he said. 'It's a complete wreck. The whole thing is like a pile of metal.'

Gaby Rudy, an 18-year-old from Livingston, New Jersey, was headed home from George Washington University when the derailment occurred. She said she was nearly asleep when she suddenly felt the train 'fall off the track'.

The next few minutes were filled with broken glass and smoke, said Rudy, who suffered minor injuries. 'They told us we had to run away from the train in case another train came,' she said.

Another passenger, Daniel Wetrin, was among more than a dozen people taken to a nearby elementary school afterward.

'I think the fact that I walked off (the train) kind of made it even more surreal because a lot of people didn't walk off,' he said.

'I walked off as if, like, I was in a movie. There were people standing around, people with bloody faces. There were people, chairs, tables mangled about in the compartment ... power cables all buckled down as you stepped off the train.'

Roads all around the crash site were blocked off. Hundreds of firefighters surrounded the train cars, taking people out.

Several injured people, including one man complaining of neck pain, were rolled away on stretchers. Others wobbled while walking away or were put on city buses. An elderly woman was given oxygen.

Former U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy was on the train and said he helped people. He tweeted photos of firefighters helping other people in the wreckage.

'Pray for those injured,' he said.

Senator Tom Carper of Delaware also was on the Amtrak train but got off in Wilmington, shortly before the derailment. He later tweeted that he was 'grateful to be home safe and sound'.

Search: Emergency responders can be seen looking for injured passengers after several cars overturned on Tuesday night

Escape to safety: A police officer assists a man as he leaves the scene of the train crash on Tuesday evening

Injuries: Emergency personnel carry the injured away from the scene of a deadly train wreck; more than 140 people were taken to hospital

On Wednesday morning, President Obama also released a statement saying he and his wife Michelle were 'shocked and deeply saddened' to hear of the tragedy.

'Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families and friends of those we lost last night, and to the many passengers who today begin their long road to recovery,' he said.

'Along the Northeast Corridor, Amtrak is a way of life for many. From Washington, DC and Philadelphia to New York City and Boston, this is a tragedy that touches us all.

'As we work to determine exactly what happened, I commend the fire, police and medical personnel working tirelessly and professionally to save lives.'

'Philadelphia is known as the city of brotherly love – a city of neighborhoods and neighbors – and that spirit of loving-kindness was reaffirmed last night, as hundreds of first responders and passengers lent a hand to their fellow human beings in need.'

Hillary Clinton added on Twitter: 'Heartbroken for the passengers and families affected by #Amtrak188, and grateful to all the first responders on the scene.'

The area where the derailment occurred is known as Frankford Junction and has a big curve. It's not far from where one of the nation's deadliest train accidents occurred: the 1943 derailment of The Congressional Limited, from Washington to New York, which killed 79 people.

Amtrak said rail service on the busy Northeast Corridor between New York and Philadelphia had been stopped.

Derailed: On Tuesday night, a crime scene investigator looks inside a train car after the wreck sent seven of the cars off the tracks

Rushed to safety: Emergency personnel work the scene of the deadly train wreck in Philadelphia on Tuesday night

Hurt: More than 240 people were on the train at the time it derailed shortly after 9pm on Tuesday as it headed to New York

The mayor, citing the mangled train tracks and downed wires, said: 'There's no circumstance under which there would be any Amtrak service this week through Philadelphia.'

In a bizarre twist, just minutes before the derailment, a separate SEPTA commuter train on its way to Trenton was brought to a halt after a 'projectile' smashed through the engineer's window, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. Authorities are investigating but said they do not believe the two incidents are connected.

The derailment happened in Port Richmond, one of five neighborhoods in what's known as Philadelphia's River Wards, dense rowhouse neighborhoods located off the Delaware River. Area resident David Hernandez, whose home is close to the tracks, heard the derailment.

'It sounded like a bunch of shopping carts crashing into each other,' he said.

The crashing sound lasted a few seconds, he said, and then there was chaos and screaming.

Governor Tom Wolf, who was in touch with the mayor and other state and local officials about the derailment, thanked the first responders for 'their brave and quick action'.

'My thoughts and prayers are with all of those impacted by tonight's train derailment,' he said in a statement. 'For those who lost their lives, those who were injured, and the families of all involved, this situation is devastating.'

Amtrak hotline for those concerned they may have friends and family on board: 800-523-9101