On 4 January 2018, a passenger train operated by Shosholoza Meyl collided with a truck at a level crossing at Geneva Station between Hennenman and Kroonstad, in the Free State, South Africa.

[2][3][4][5] Witnesses stated that the truck failed to stop at the level crossing,[6][7] despite the train driver giving warning by blowing the horn.

[11]: 9  The first responders were local farmers and farm workers who rushed to the collision site with fire-fighting equipment and began pulling people out of the burning carriages.

[11]: 9  Eyewitness and farmer Willie du Preez, said that the fire began ten minutes after the collision, with the first flames behind the locomotive which spread towards the derailed carriages and trapped passengers.

[18]: 3  Heavy recovery equipment was brought in by PRASA Rail, two days after the collision, to remove the debris from the crash site so that the railway line could be repaired and reopened.

[18]: 3  He claimed that there is a blind spot which prevents one, for a moment, from seeing on-coming trains as well as potholes in the road that slow vehicles speeds at the crossing.

[20] The owner of the articulated tipper truck, Cordene Trading, expressed the firm's condolences to the victims and their families through the company's lawyer.

[11]: 9 The driver described, when seeing the truck on the crossing, how he tooted the train's horn and applied the brakes with a realisation he and his assistant could do nothing as they were trapped in the cabin.

[21]: 2 On 26 January 2018, PRASA announced that the DNA testing of the remains were completed and the results would be made known to the relatives of the victims at a gathering at the Virginia Council Chambers, Free State.

[22]: 8 The South African Railway Safety Regulator convened a Board of Inquiry to investigate the collision and released a report in October 2018.