Louisiana State Trooper Sgt. J.C. Neal, far left, Trooper Sanikka Williams and Trooper Wilson Matthews comb the area surrounding a car-train collision on Mound Road in Mound Tuesday. The collision killed Leigh Ann Holloway, 15, and injured her brother, 17-year-old Brennan Holloway.(The Vicksburg Post/MELANIE DUNCAN)

[03/20/02]One of two Tallulah Academy students injured in a car-train wreck Tuesday morning died of her injuries in Vicksburg Tuesday afternoon.

Leigh Ann Holloway, 15, 226 Mound Road in Thomastown in Madison Parish, was pronounced dead at River Region Medical Center at 1:32 p.m. Tuesday, said Larry Chisley, Warren County’s deputy coroner.

Chisley said the cause of death was multiple organ injuries including a spinal cord injury. He ruled the death was due to the 1994 Ford Explorer in which she was a passenger being hit by a westbound Kansas City Southern train.

Louisiana State police said Holloway and her brother, who was driving, were hit at 7:40 a.m. at the railroad crossing on Mound Road at Thomastown, apparently on their way to the school where she was a sophomore, said State Police Sgt. J.C. Neal.

David Brennan Holloway, 17, a junior at Tallulah Academy, was taken to River Region and transferred to St. Dominic Hospital in Jackson.

Brennan was in surgery, reportedly for treatment of a neck injury, at about 9 this morning and no condition report was available, a St. Dominic spokesman said.

“This has profoundly affected the whole school,” said Reba Duncan, an English teacher at Tallulah Academy. She said the school has just a few more than 300 students and most of them have attended the K-12 school since kindergarten and most of the teachers have taught most of the students. “Everyone is profoundly upset because we are, indeed, a family.”

Duncan taught Brennan during the last school year and had Leigh Ann in her class this year.

Stephanie Cox, a computer teacher at Tallulah Academy, taught Leigh Ann and was her cheerleader sponsor last school year when Leigh Ann was a junior varsity cheerleader.

“She was just always happy,” Cox said. “She was very quiet and wanted to make everyone around her happy.”

Cox also said Leigh Ann always wanted her work, her performance and friendships to be perfect. “She was either fourth or fifth in her class,” Cox said.

Since she also taught Brennan, Cox said he is an outgoing person and one of the leaders of his class.

“They recently had their prom and he was one of the leaders in putting up the decorations,” she said.

A spokesman at the Louisiana State Police Troop F headquarters said a citation for failure to yield to a train was issued to Brennan Holloway.