1993 Big Bayou Canot train wreck
The wreck of the Sunset Limited at Big Bayou Canot
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| Date | September 22, 1993 |
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| Time | 2:53 am |
| Location | Mobile, Alabama |
| Country | United States |
| Rail line | CSX Transportation |
| Operator | Amtrak |
| Type of incident | Derailment |
| Cause | Barge collision with bridge / wrong design |
| Statistics | |
| Trains | 1 |
| Passengers | 220 |
| Deaths | 47 |
| Injuries | 103 |
The 1993 Big Bayou Canot train wreck was the derailing of an Amtrak train on the CSXT Big Bayou Canot bridge in northeastern Mobile, Alabama, United States, on September 22, 1993. It was caused by displacement of a span and deformation of the rails when a tow of heavy barges had collided with the bridge eight minutes earlier. Forty-seven were killed and 103 were injured. To date, it is both the deadliest train wreck in Amtrak's history and the worst rail disaster in the United States since the 1958 Newark Bay, New Jersey rail accident in which 48 lives were lost.
The CSX Transportation unfinished swing bridge over the Big Bayou Canot in southwestern Alabama (about 10 miles northeast of Mobile) was struck at approximately 2:45 a.m. by a barge being pushed by the towboat Mauvilla (owned and operated by Warrior and Gulf Navigation of Chickasaw, Alabama), whose pilot had become disoriented in heavy fog. The collision forced the unsecured end of a bridge span approximately three feet out of alignment, into the path of an oncoming train, and severely kinked the track.
At 2:53 a.m., Amtrak's Sunset Limited train, powered by three locomotives (one GE Genesis P40DC number 819 in the front, and two EMD F40PHs, numbers 262 and 312) en route from Los Angeles, California to Miami, Florida with 220 passengers and crew aboard, crossed the bridge at around 70 miles per hour (110 km/h) and derailed at the kink. The first of its three locomotives slammed into the displaced span, causing that part of the bridge to collapse into the water beneath. The lead locomotive embedded itself nose-first into the canal bank, and the other two locomotives, together with the baggage car, dormitory car and two of the six passenger cars, plunged into the water. The locomotives' fuel tanks, each of which held several thousand gallons of diesel fuel, ruptured upon impact, resulting in a massive fuel spill and a fire. Forty-seven people, 42 of whom were passengers, were killed, many by drowning, others by fire/smoke inhalation. Another 103 were injured. The towboat's four crew members were not injured.
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