The nation's freight railroads are making impressive gains in safety this year, according to data from the Federal Railroad Administration. If current trends continue through the end of the year, the train accident rate, employee casualty rate and grade crossing incident rate will all be the lowest in history.

During the first nine months of this year the number of train accidents was down 13.1 percent from last year while the accident rate per million train miles was down even more sharply, 15.3 percent.

The employee casualty rate at the end of September was down 12.0 percent from last year, while the number of employee fatalities was down by 52.4 percent.

The grade crossing incident rate is down 3.7 percent from last year, although the number of grade crossing fatalities was up 3.1 percent.

"These improvements are especially satisfying given the fact that during the first nine months of this year railroads moved more freight than ever before," said Association of American Railroads (AAR) President and CEO Edward R. Hamberger. "At the same time, railroads were hiring thousands of new workers to keep up with demand."

He attributed the improved safety record both to "dedication of our employees and to thoroughness of our industry's employee training programs. Beyond this, railroads have also invested billions of dollars annually in recent years to maintain and improve track and equipment as well as to upgrade signaling systems."

Hamberger predicted that safety would continue to improve as railroads deploy new train control technology that reduces the potential for human error and expand predictive equipment maintenance programs that identify potential component failures before an accident occurs.

The first nine months of this year also saw significant reductions in various categories of train accidents. Collisions were down 28.6 percent and the number of derailments declined by 9.5 percent. Yard accidents declined by 18.4 percent. Reductions were also reported in each of the primary causes of accidents, with those caused by human factors down 21.1 percent; signals, down 26.0 percent; equipment, down 10.5 percent; and track, down 6.5 percent.

"North America's freight railroads are committed to the safety of our employees and the communities we serve," Hamberger said. "Safety is our number one priority." KW