A train wreck occurs when a train crashes. It most often occurs as a result of an accident, as when a wheel jumps off a mislain track, or miscommunication, as when a moving train meets another train on the same track, or when the locomotive explodes. Train wrecks were occasionally staged for public entertainment; crowds watched as two vacant trains were deliberately sent speeding toward each other.

As metaphor

The term is sometimes used metaphorically to describe a disaster that you can see coming but cannot stop, such as former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich's assertion that a government shutdown would be a "train wreck." Educators warn that attaching a high school diploma to a test such as WASL that fails over half of students would lead to a "train wreck".

The term "train wreck" is also used metaphorically to describe something distasteful or disastrous, yet inevitable, or something distasteful yet compelling in some form ("You don't want to stare, but you just can't look away").

Legal consequences

Because train wrecks usually cause widespread property damage as well as injury or death, the intentional wrecking of a train in regular service is often treated as an extremely serious crime. For example, in the U.S. state of California, the maximum penalty for intentionally causing a fatal train wreck is death, and the minimum penalty is life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.See California Penal Code Section 219.^*

See also

• List of rail accidents

External links

• A train wreck site, with photos
• BBC News: World's worst rail disasters (Last updated on July 13, 2005)

References

Railway accidents