@JimmyMcNulty - The only reason I spent any time at all on this is because in 1980 I was in high school, so I thought I would remember if there was an average of NINTY SIX (96) train derailments EVERY SINGLE DAY, for a WHOLE YEAR. Seriously man, does that even sound the slightest bit reasonable? Maybe they mean like if a wheel comes loose, it's identified at the next stop, and that car is flagged for maintenance? Even then 96 every day seems like a stretch.
Don't know where the NY Times dug that up, but it sounds absolutely absurd. I couldn't find very much historical data to either corroborate or disprove that figure, but common sense would tell you that 99% of them were so minor and inconsequential that they didn't even make the news. In fact, taking away 99% would still mean 350 or almost 1 per day, and since there are only a few "newsworthy" derailments every year, I'd say almost NONE of those 35,000 were of any real importance.
And regarding the 1000 or so number (currently) I've heard thrown around, well here's an article from Newsweek dated 2/13/23: newsweek.com
According to this there have been "more than a dozen" derailments thus far, meaning 1-1/2 months into the year. If you take that to mean about 15 and annualize it, that's 120. A far cry from 1000, but still one every three days. Do you hear about a train derailment twice a week all year long? I don't. That's because almost all of them are of no real consequence.
This disaster is potentially comparable to the Flint Michigan water crisis a few years ago, but that incompetent faggot Mayor Pete tries to marginalize it and downplay his own responsibility as Transportation Secretary by telling us it's just one of a thousand derailments. God forbid he might have to work an extra hour one day and be late getting home for a good ass-fucking.