List of rail accidents (1950–1959)

This is a list of rail accidents from 1950 to 1959.

1950 January 29 – India – At Sirhind, a goods train and a mail train collide, killing 63 people, about half of them soldiers. February 17 – United States – Rockville Centre train crash, Rockville Centre, New York: Two passenger trains collide head-on at Rockville Centre station. The engineer of train number 192 ignored an Approach and the following Stop signals and collided with train number 175 on temporary gantleted (overlapping) track which had been installed to facilitate a grade separation project. Both engineers survived but 31 people were killed, and more than 100 people injured. February 26 – United States – A Lehigh Valley Railroad freight train is derailed at Mehoopany, Pennsylvania, destroying the railway station there. March 7 – United Kingdom – An overnight express passenger train overruns danger signals in fog and collides with the rear of a mineral train south west of , Essex; and northeast of Witham Junction. The passenger fireman and goods guard were killed. April 6 – Brazil – At Tanguá on the Leopoldina Railway, flooding of the Rio Tanguá in heavy rain causes a bridge to collapse under a train going from Rio de Janeiro to Vitória. The locomotive and several cars fall into the river; 90 people swim to safety, but 110 are killed and over 300 injured. June 5 – United Kingdom – The Flying Scotsman train derails at Tollerton, Nottinghamshire due to heat-buckled track. June 8 – United Kingdom – A fire on a train at Beattock, Dumfriesshire kills five people. July 12 – East Germany – A workers' train collides with a stationary freight between Zwickau and Aue, killing 20 people and injuring at least 50. August 27 – United Kingdom – An express passenger train collides with a light engine at Penmaenmawr, Caernarfonshire due to a signalman's error. Five people are killed in the first major accident for British Railways. September 2 – United States – Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Two Milwaukee Electric Railway and Light Company trains chartered by the National Model Railroad Association collided head on killing 10 and injuring 47. Poor visibility and a lack of formal dispatching practices were to blame.History of The Milwaukee Electric Railway & Light Company September 3 – India – On the Pathankot-to-Amritsar line of the Eastern Punjab Railway, the Kashmir Mail train to Delhi is derailed near Gurdaspur due to an "error of judgment" by railway staff. The locomotive and 3 cars fall down an embankment and 12 people are killed. September 6 – Brazil – At Pantojo on the Sorocabana line, a derailment kills 36. September 11 – United States – Coshocton, Ohio: The Pennsylvania Railroad's train number 31, the westbound Spirit of St. Louis ignores the warning Approach signal [maximum speed , next signal at red] and, traveling at in dense fog, rear-ends a stopped troop train carrying the 109th Infantry Regiment from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, killing 33. The engineer of the Spirit of St. Louis is to blame. October 23 – United Kingdom – A passenger train is derailed at Drumburgh Moss, Cumberland due to defective track and the failure to implement a speed restriction. Three people are injured. November 15 – Norway – Hjuksebø train collision: Seven freight cars run away from the train to which they should have been attached and collide with a passenger train, killing 14 people. November 21 – Canada – Canoe River train crash: A westbound Canadian National Railway train carrying Korea-bound troops is given incorrectly copied orders and collides with eastbound passenger train number 2, killing 21 people – the enginemen of both trains and 17 soldiers. November 22 – United States – Kew Gardens train crash: A collision between two Long Island Rail Road commuter trains near Kew Gardens Station killed 79 people and injured 352, making it the worst passenger railroad accident of both LIRR and New York history.Long Island Rail Road Wrecks

1951 February 6 – United States – Woodbridge train derailment, New Jersey: The Broker, a Pennsylvania Railroad passenger train derails, killing 85 people and injuring more than 500. February 9 – Canada – Coniston, Sudbury, Ontario, ice fog from −44 °C temperatures led to a crash between a Canadian Pacific Railway passenger train and a Nickel Belt Coach Lines bus at a level crossing. The bus was carrying workers home from the nearby International Nickel Company. Nine people died as a result. March 16 – United Kingdom – Doncaster rail crash. A driver was in the habit of exceeding a certain crossover's speed limit, but a track defect derailed the train and it crashed into an overbridge; 14 people died. April 24 – Japan – Sakuragichō train fire, A commuter train's pantograph catches fire on the approach to Sakuragichō Station, Yokohama, killing at least 106 people and injuring 93. June 7 – Brazil – Nova Iguaçu level crossing disaster, A commuter train collides with a truck carrying gasoline at a level crossing at Nova Iguaçu, northwestern Rio de Janeiro, killing at least 54 people.Haine, 1993, p. 141. July 22 – Czechoslovakia – Tatranská Lomnica: In the Slovakian Tatra Mountains (Vysoké Tatry), two ČSD passenger cars collide. 19 people are killed. A similar crash had occurred in 1895 at the same place. August 5 – United Kingdom – An electric multiple unit overruns signals and collides with another at , West Sussex. Eight people are killed and 47 seriously injured. August 10 - United States - A troop train collided with a "Streamliner" near Lettsworth, Louisiana. Eight US Marines are killed. August 17 – United Kingdom – Two electric multiple units collide at after one of them overruns signals. Three people are killed. August 18 – Hungary – Székesfehérvár: Two passenger trains collide due to an error by an inexperienced signal operator; six people are killed (one in the hospital). . August 24 – France – At Sanry-sur-Nied, a Frankfurt to Paris express is stopped by signals. The conductor tries to go back and put down detonators, but before he has gone , a Basel-to-Calais express arrives at and crashes into the first train, one car of which ends up on the roof of another. Altogether 23 people are killed and 40 wounded, many of them French or American soldiers. The signalman is blamed. September 21 – United Kingdom – Weedon rail crash: Defective maintenance on locomotive bogie causing derailment which killed 15. September 25 – Austria – At Langenwang station on the Semmering Pass line, the supervisor decides to take advantage of the fact that a Vienna-to-Rome express is running late by allowing the shunting of a freight train to proceed, blocking the express's path. When informed that the express is reaching Mürzzuschlag, in the hope of not delaying it he prematurely clears signals so it can approach the shunting train closer than the usual safety margin, and tries to hurry the shunting driver along. , killing 22 people and injuring 50, 11 seriously. All of the fatalities are among a party of Italian railwaymen and their families, who had been visiting Vienna by invitation of the Austrian railways. October 5 – Colombia – Near the town of Montenegro, on the line from Armenia to Pereira, a passenger train is struck by a landslide, possibly triggered by the train's own vibration; 26 are killed. November 12 – United States – At Evanston, Wyoming, on the Union Pacific Railroad, a rear-end collision of the trains City of Los Angeles and City of San Francisco kills 17 people, or kills 26 people and injures 200. Tony Ippolito died in the wreck. November 25 – United States – A head-on collision on the Southern Railway kills 17 people. December 17 – Brazil – Piquet Carneiro train crash: A derailment due to excess speed at Piquet Carneiro kills 53.

1952 March 4 – Brazil – Anchieta rail disaster near Rio de Janeiro kills 119 people when a high-speed electric freight train collides with a derailed passenger train. April 21 – United Kingdom – A Thames-Clyde Express passenger train is derailed at Blea Moor, Lancashire due to a faulty locomotive causing points to open under the train. May 7 – Australia – A fully laden passenger train collides in dense fog with a stationary train at Berala railway station. Ten people are killed and 137 injured.Berala Inquest . The Canberra Times. July 10, 1952.Sydney rail disaster cause not yet solved. The Age. May 8, 1952. May 18 – India – Passenger and freight trains are erroneously allowed to enter the same section from Bikaner in the direction toward Jodhpur. They collide, killing 45 and injuring 67. May 18(?) – Turkey – The derailment of a mixed train between Ulukışla and Adana kills 26 people. July 9 – Poland – Rzepin train disaster: A fast Pt47 steam locomotive allegedly derailed in Rzepin. 160 people died. October 8 – United Kingdom – Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash: Three trains are involved in a crash that kills 112 people and injures 340. A rear-end collision due to a driver passing a signal at danger in fog is immediately followed by another express running into the wreckage.Many die as three trains crash at Harrow. BBC News. October 8, 1952. October 15 – British Nigeria – A breakdown crane on the way to a goods train derailment comes uncoupled from its locomotive, rolls downhill backwards, and crashes into a passenger train south of Ibadan, killing at least 34 people. A young survivor runs for help 4.8 km (3 miles) to the nearest road, where he happens upon the district officer and his senior medical officer; but rescue is hampered as there is no other crane nearer than Enugu. October 20 – South Africa – The locomotive and 10 cars of the night mail train from Durban to Johannesburg derail on a curve at Heavitree, past Estcourt, killing 21 people and injuring about 50. November 8 – United Kingdom – An electric multiple unit suffers a brake malfunction, overruns signals and collides with a steam locomotive at , Surrey. Two people are killed and 37 are injured.

1953 January 15 – United States – 1953 Pennsylvania Railroad train wreck: Approaching Union Station in Washington, D.C., the brakes partially fail on the Pennsylvania Railroad Federal Express overnight train from Boston. The 16-car train smashes through the bumper into the station, where the heavy electric locomotive breaks through the floor. There are 43 people injured but nobody is killed. The locomotive is left in place under a temporarily repaired floor until after Dwight D. Eisenhower's January 20 inauguration as president. January 17 – United States – An Atlantic Coast Line passenger train and a Southern Railway freight train collided in the small community of Fleming, Georgia. 2 people (the train's engineer and fireman) died and 85 others were injured. The cause of the crash, according to the Interstate Commerce Commission, was "excessive speed". February 15 – Italy – A train from Lecce to Naples and Rome derails in Benevento due to excessive speed; 23 are killed. February 15 – Argentina – Comodoro Rivadavia rail disaster (1953): At Comodoro Rivadavia, a railbus derails on an embankment and falls, killing 23 people and injuring 42. March 27 – United States – 1953 New York Central Railroad accident: Conneaut, Ohio: Three New York Central trains tangle near Conneaut on the four-track mainline on the night of March 27. Twenty-one people die. The cause is found to be an improperly secured gondola load—a section of pipe fell from a freight car onto the adjacent track and was struck by a passenger train. April 8 – United Kingdom – Stratford tube crash: 12 people were killed as a result of a rear-end collision in a tunnel. April 27 – United States – Union Pacific Big Boy 4005 jumps at a switch track at 50 mph (80 km/h) and derails in southern Wyoming. The engineer and fireman were killed on impact, while the brakeman died from his injuries in a hospital a few days later.