Why are train derailments so common?

Derailments rank as the most common type of accident involving major freight railroads, federal data shows. Equipment failures are increasingly responsible for derailments, and problems with equipment and train tracks accounted for nearly 60% of derailments nationwide last year.



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Derailments are often tied to equipment failures, human error, and track defects. While we still don't know what caused the Minnesota train derailment, there are factors we know about that may contribute to rail accidents overall. Human error and track defects are two of the biggest causes of derailments, for example.

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The estimated accident rate in 2019 is 0.85 fatal collisions or derailments per billion train-kilometres, which represents a fall of 78% since 1990. This gives an estimated mean number of fatal accidents in Europe in 2019 of 3.89.

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There are about three train derailments per day. They usually aren't disasters The U.S. saw more than one thousand train derailments last year, but industry leaders say traveling by rail remains one of the safest methods of transportation.

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Compared to other popular forms of travel, such as cars, ships, buses, and planes, trains are one of the safest forms of transportation in the United States.

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What is the safest railway in the world? Japan's Shinkansen high-speed rail network opened for business on 1 October 1964. Since then the system has carried nearly 7 billion passengers without a single fatality due to collision.

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According to Gattie and the FRA, “a derailment happens when on-track equipment leaves the rail for a reason other than a collision, explosion, highway-rail grade crossing impact, etc.” Gattie also said that most derailments happen inside the rail yards and are caused by faulty tracks or basic human error.

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They aren't usually major disasters.

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According to Statista, you have a one in 243,756 chance of dying in a train crash as a passenger. The chances of someone dying in a railway vehicle are the lowest compared to all other vehicles, including air and space transportation, heavy vehicles, buses, motorcycles, cars, etc.

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Union Pacific CEO Lance Fritz said recently that he doesn't think accident data shows that long trains are riskier. But the Federal Railroad Administration cited three derailments involving trains longer than 12,250 feet (3,734 meters) where train length was a factor in its advisory.

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1. Switzerland. Tucked inside the small but incredibly beautiful country of Switzerland is one of the most efficient and scenic rail networks in the world.

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According to a 2022 report on Railway Safety and Interoperability in the EU, railways in Europe remain “among the safest in the world” with major accidents involving five or more fatalities becoming “increasingly rare”.

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The United States possesses the largest railway network in the world, in terms of total operating length.

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“Britain continues to have one of the safest railways in Europe, and thankfully, incidents such as those that occurred at Carmont in August 2020 are very rare. “Safety targets are imposed to ensure a minimum level of safety is achieved and it is important our railway continues to strive for better.”

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It probably comes as no surprise that in a global 2019 survey of railroad efficiency, the top two places went to Japan and Hong Kong, with scores of 6.8 and 6.5 (out of seven) respectively.

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Running since 1929, Hawaiian is among the oldest airlines in the world but, remarkably, it has never suffered a single fatal crash or hull loss.

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While fatalities from train derailments are rare, derailments themselves are actually quite common. From 1990, the first year the BTS began tracking derailments and injuries on a yearly basis, to 2022, there have been 55,741 accidents in which a train derailed. That's an average of 1,689 derailments per year.

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  1. Airplane Safety. Airplanes are by far the safest mode of transportation when the number of transported passengers are measured against personal injuries and fatality totals, even though all plane crashes generally receive some form of media attention. ...
  2. Train Safety. ...
  3. Bus Travel. ...
  4. Boat Travel.


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