According to data from the Federal Railroad Administration, 2018 saw a total of 2,873 accidents, resulting in 169 fatalities. So far for 2019, there have been 2,718 accidents resulting in 208 fatalities. It would seem that accidents involving trains are on the rise by taking a look at these numbers alone. A great majority of these accidents are caused by human error, such as trespassing on train tracks and not yielding to the train at a crossing. Further analysis of the statistics beings the news that some states are more dangerous than others when it comes to train accidents, as the Miami Herald reports.
Injury Claim Coach released results from its Railroad Crossings study. After analyzing four years of data from the Federal Railroad Administration, from 2014 to 2018, the study determined that Florida ranked number six in states with the highest number of railroad crossing accidents.
Florida had a total of 462 reported railroad-related accidents during this time frame.
These accidents, which led to 16% of them being fatal and 25% resulting in injury. This means that Florida ranks number 11 for train accidents that are fatal and number 27 for accidents that lead to injury.
The high-speed Brightline rail, which runs along the east coast of the state between Miami and Jacksonville saw 76 of those fatalities. Many of these train-related deaths are linked to low-income areas where pedestrians live near railroads and are less likely to heed precautions.
65% of the accidents involved pedestrians. 29% involved motorcycles. School buses also accounted for a great percentage of train-crossing accidents.
Suicides accounted for 2% of fatal pedestrian accidents. Florida ranked in at #11 when it came to the highest number of suicides or attempted suicides by residents.