Editing Railroad switch (section)

=== Accidents ===
Switch-related accidents caused by one or more of these risks have occurred, including:
* The 1980 [[Buttevant Rail Disaster]] at [[Buttevant]], [[County Cork]], in Ireland, when the [[Dublin]]–[[Cork (city)|Cork]] express was derailed at high speed after being inadvertently switched into a siding via [[ground frame]] operated points, resulting in 18 deaths.
* Wrecks caused by switches being thrown open in front of the trains by [[Sabotage|saboteurs]], as in the non-fatal derailments near [[Newport News, Virginia|Newport News]], on 12 August 1992, and in [[Stewiacke, Nova Scotia|Stewiacke]], on 12 April 2001. To prevent these incidents, most unused switches are locked.
* The Eschede train disaster in 1998 in Germany was one of the world's deadliest high-speed train accidents, resulting in 101 deaths. It occurred when a wheel rim of an ICE train failed at {{Convert|200|km/h|mph}}, partially derailing the car. The wheel rim went through the floor of the carriage and was dragging on the ground. While passing through the station at Eschede it threw a switch, causing the rear wheels of the car to switch onto a track diverging from the track taken by the front wheels. The car was thereby thrown into and destroyed the piers supporting a 300-tonne roadway overpass.
* The [[Potters Bar rail accidents#2002|May 2002 Potters Bar rail crash]] at [[Potters Bar]], [[Hertfordshire]], in the United Kingdom, occurred when a switch sprang to a different position as a coach crossed it, a type of mishap called ''splitting the switch''. The front wheels of a coach progressed along the straight track as intended, but the rear wheels slewed along the diverging track. This caused the whole coach to detach from the train and slew sideways across the [[Railway platform|platform]] ahead. The movement of the switch occurred beneath the final coach, so that the preceding coaches remained on the track. Poor maintenance of the points was found to be the primary cause of the crash.
* The interim report into the [[Grayrigg derailment]] of 23 February 2007 blamed an incorrectly maintained set of points.<ref>{{cite web |title=Train Derailment at Grayrigg, Cumbria 23 February 2007 – RAIB Interim Report |url=https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/547c903840f0b60244000197/IR12007_070226_Grayrigg.pdf |website=Assets.Publishing.Service.gov.uk |publisher=Rail Accident Investigation Branch |date=26 February 2007 |page=9 |access-date=15 April 2025 }}</ref>
** On 31 July 1991, several cars derailed, killing seven passengers, due to a missing locking pin on the switch mechanism.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Clark |first1=Chuck |last2=Davidson |first2=Tom |date=2 August 1991 |title=Boca Man among 7 Killed in Amtrak Wreck |website=[[Sun-Sentinel|Ft Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel]] |url=https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1991-08-02-9101290143-story.html |access-date=13 February 2019 }}</ref> 
** Twenty-seven years later, on 4 August 2018, the Silver Star [[Cayce, South Carolina, train collision|crashed into a parked freight train]] on a siding due to a misaligned switch, killing two crewmen.<ref>{{cite magazine |last1=Edmonson |first1=R.G. |last2=Sweeney |first2=Steve |date=4 February 2018 |title=NTSB: Misaligned Switch Directed 'Silver Star' into Parked CSX Autorack Train |magazine=[[Trains (magazine)|Trains]] |url=https://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2018/02/04-two-dead-after-amtrak-silver-star-contacts-csx-train-and-derails |access-date=13 February 2019 }}</ref>