1887 Great Chatsworth train wreck

The railway accident in Chatsworth occurred about five kilometers east of Chatsworth, Illinois on August 10, 1887, when a train at the crossing brought a wooden truss bridge to collapse. This resulted in at least 81 deaths and a large number of casualties.

Starting position

The wrecked train the Toledo, Peoria and Western Railroad (TP & W) was at night on the way from Peoria to Niagara Falls. He was pulled by two locomotives, consisted of six crowded coaches, six sleeper and three baggage car and was generally busy with about 700 passengers.

The accident site was a wooden truss bridge, which had suffered fire damage in the course of the day. The summer of 1887 was hot and dry in Illinois. In order to prevent these conditions, bush fires by sparks of steam locomotives, the Toledo, Peoria and Western Railroad kept the fire stripe along their railway lines freely through controlled burning. Such action had taken place the day of the accident in the vicinity of the bridge and it was subsequently believed that the fire at the bridge it created that such a controlled fire was not completely extinguished.

The accident

The train was about 65 km / h over the bridge. The first locomotive had just crossed the bridge, than this, due to the fire damage, collapsed. The second locomotive struck on the slope under the bridge and on the following vehicles fell behind and pushed into each other. Only the sleeper at the end of the train came before the bridge into the tracks to stop. The accident had 81-85 deaths result and the figures on casualties vary between 169 and 372

Follow

Four days after the accident, the wreckage of the train were burned on the spot. The accident drew attention to the increased safety of passenger coaches in steel construction, which were procured increased in the subsequent period.