(The following story by Frank Graham appeared on the North Platte Bulletin website on February 7.)
There is a train derailment accident somewhere in the U.S. every five hours, according to the Federal Railroad Administration.
Union Pacific Railroad is beating the national average in reducing derailments. Last year Union Pacific reduced derailments more than 20 percent company-wide, from 617 in 2006 to 483 in 2007.
There were 1,696 derailments nationwide from all railroad companies, a reduction of 14 percent from 1,982 derailments in 2006.
Union Pacific reported 35 derailments within Nebraska in 2007, a 14-percent reduction from 41 reported in 2006.
But not all derailments are reported, according to Mark Davis, UP spokesman. Derailments that fall under a certain dollar amount do not have to be reported to the FRA and there is no way to know how many of those occur each year.
A derailment Wednesday afternoon in North Platte may be one of those that is reported. The derailment, at about 4:30 p.m., is still under investigation but one witness believed the train might have been back-switched in error.
There were no injuries and only a small amount of diesel fuel was spilled. Officials said it was contained and cleaned up in a matter of hours.
Crains re-railed the engines by early evening.
“The pure definition of a derailment is when one wheel is off the rail,” Davis said. “We examine every derailment whether it is reportable or not.”
Davis said the railroad has derailment prevention teams that examine each derailment whether large or small in order to drive down derailments.
According to Davis, derailments are not good for business.
“They delay customer’s goods and raise many safety issues,” Davis said.
Davis said a good example of derailment prevention occurred in the late 1970s.
“Railroads experienced an increase in broken wheel derailments,” Davis said. “We learned that more and heavier materials were being shipped by rail. The additional weight would heat the wheels until the broke when the brakes were applied.”
Davis said the railroad considered building the steel stronger but then hit on an ingenious idea.
“Instead of keeping the wheels flat, we began casting wheels that looked like a cup saucer,” Davis said. “Instead of keeping the wheels flat, we began casting wheels that looked like a cup saucer,”