A woman was struck and killed by a train Tuesday after rushing onto a Yokohama railroad crossing and moving to safety a 74-year-old man she saw lying on the tracks, police said.

Natsue Murata, 40, a company employee from Yokohama, was in a car with her father waiting at the crossing when they saw the man lying on the tracks at around 11:30 a.m. Tuesday.

As soon as she saw the man, she rushed out from the front passenger seat and tried to save him, the police said.

"I have to save him," she cried out, according to her father, Shigehiro Murata, 67. "I said don't go. There isn't enough time," he later told reporters.

She managed to move the man but couldn't avoid the oncoming train, the police said.

A passerby pushed the emergency button and the train's driver braked hard, but couldn't stop the train in time, according to the police.

The man was taken to a hospital where he was treated for a broken collarbone. The police said they planned to question him.

Murata and her father were returning to their workplace, a real estate firm he manages. The incident occurred at a crossing between Kamoi and Nakayama stations on the JR Yokohama Line.

The train was bound for Hashimoto from Higashi-Kanagawa.

"Although you died, the man's life was saved. I can only say that," Shigehiro Murata said of his daughter.

On Wednesday, many people offered flowers and prayed for Murata at the accident site.

A 68-year-old man who lives nearby said he felt very sorry for her father.

"I don't know what to say, thinking about the father's feelings. He saw his daughter killed in front of him," the man said.