(Discovery Times issued the following news release on November 1.)
SILVER SPRING, Md. — Based on an exclusive, ongoing investigative series for The New York Times by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Walt Bogdanich, TROUBLE ON THE TRACKS tells a disturbing story about how some of the nation’s largest railroad corporations have allegedly tried to sidestep blame and avoid liability for hundreds of deadly accidents at railroad crossings.
TROUBLE ON THE TRACKS, a Discovery Times Channel world premiere documentary, makes its debut on Sunday, November 14, at 9 PM (ET/PT). The documentary will also air on November 15 at midnight, 5 a.m., 8 a.m., 1 p.m. and 4 p.m.
An intricate web of railroad tracks crisscrosses America for nearly 200,000 miles, carrying hundreds of thousands of passengers and 40 percent of all the freight in the United States. But on average, one person is killed each day at a railroad crossing — more than 1,600 in the last four years, or twice the number killed in commercial airplane crashes. While deaths are often caused by reckless or negligent pedestrians and motorists, TROUBLE ON THE TRACKS explores the responsibility of the railroads in these fatal accidents.
TROUBLE ON THE TRACKS opens with a single accident in Arkansas and looks at other accidents across the United States, revealing new information that raises troubling questions about the rail industry and the way it is regulated. In interviews with industry and government representatives as well as victims and their families, the documentary shows how some railroad corporations have been accused of destroying and manipulating crucial evidence, failing to properly report fatal accidents and trying to shift blame onto the victims.
The Discovery Times Channel (http://www.discovery.com/times) combines the authority of The New York Times with the programming excellence of Discovery Communications. The Discovery Times Channel is available to more than 35 million subscribers in the United States and is a joint venture between The New York Times Company (NYSE: NYT) and Discovery Communications, Inc., the leading global real-world media and entertainment company.