The Associated Press

GUTTENBERG, Iowa — Four locomotives pulling a freight train derailed early Wednesday and fell into the Mississippi River after an apparent landslide, authorities said.

The engines operated by the Iowa, Chicago & Eastern Railroad went off the tracks about 6 a.m., about two miles south of Guttenberg in northeast Iowa, the Clayton County sheriff's office said.

Dispatcher Larry Crubaugh (CREW'-bah) said the derailment happened about 2 miles south of Guttenberg where the tracks run along a bluff beside the river.

IC&E spokesman Herb Jones said two IC&E employees were treated for minor injuries.

"Early reports indicate that a large boulder and embankment slide occurred in the area of the derailment," the railroad said in a statement. "It is suspected that heavy rain saturations weakened the bluff embankment causing the slide."

Jones did not know how high the bluff was or how far the locomotives slid into the river. He also didn't have any information on how many cars the train was pulling or what it was hauling.

In late June, a IC&E locomotive and two tanker cars fell into the flooded Iowa River after a railroad bridge collapsed near Columbus Junction in southeastern Iowa. Three employees were on that train and one was taken to a hospital for treatment of non-life threatening injuries, company officials said.