FRA Railroad Accidents & Incidents Scraper

Extract railroad accident and incident reports from the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) open data portal. This Actor provides access to over 181,000 accident/incident records dating back to 1975, sourced directly from the U.S. Department of Transportation's official Socrata API.

Use this scraper to analyze railroad safety trends, research specific derailments or collisions, identify high-cost accidents by state or railroad, and build datasets for transportation safety research, insurance risk analysis, regulatory compliance monitoring, and investigative journalism.

Key Features

• 181,000+ accident records from 1975 to present
• Filter by state — target specific states using two-letter abbreviations (TX, CA, OH, etc.)
• Filter by railroad — search by railroad company name (CSX, Union Pacific, BNSF, etc.)
• Filter by year range — specify start and end years for targeted analysis
• Filter by accident type — derailments, collisions, highway-rail crossings, fires, and more
• Filter by damage cost — find only high-cost incidents above your threshold
• Detailed casualty data — employees killed/injured, passengers killed/injured, others killed/injured
• Full damage breakdown — equipment damage, track damage, and total damage costs
• Location data — state, county, station, milepost, latitude, longitude
• Environmental context — temperature, visibility, weather conditions
• Train details — speed, tonnage, locomotive count, freight/passenger car counts
• Hazmat tracking — hazmat cars involved and hazmat releases
• Accident narratives — detailed text descriptions when available
• Direct FRA report links — URL to the official Form 54 report for each incident

Field	Description
reportingRailroadName	Name of the reporting railroad company
date	Date of the accident/incident
accidentType	Type of accident (Derailment, Collision, etc.)
stateName / stateAbbr	State where the accident occurred
countyName	County where the accident occurred
station	Nearest station or location name
latitude / longitude	Geographic coordinates
totalDamageCost	Total damage cost in dollars
primaryAccidentCause	Primary cause of the accident
totalPersonsKilled	Total fatalities
totalPersonsInjured	Total injuries
trainSpeed	Speed of the train at time of accident
narrative	Detailed text description of the incident
reportUrl	Link to official FRA Form 54 report

How to Scrape FRA Railroad Accident Data

1. Go to this Actor's page on the Apify Store
2. Click "Start" to open the input configuration form
3. Set your filters:
   • Enter a State abbreviation (e.g., TX for Texas) or leave blank for all states
   • Enter a Railroad Name (e.g., Union Pacific) or leave blank for all railroads
   • Set Start Year and End Year to narrow the date range
   • Enter an Accident Type (e.g., Derailment) or leave blank for all types
   • Set a Minimum Total Damage Cost to filter for major incidents
   • Set Max Results to control how many records you want (default: 100)
4. Click "Start" to run the Actor
5. Download your data in JSON, CSV, Excel, or other formats from the Dataset tab

Example: Find All Texas Derailments in 2023 with Damage Over $100,000

{
    "state": "TX",
    "startYear": 2023,
    "endYear": 2023,
    "accidentType": "Derailment",
    "minDamageCost": 100000,
    "maxResults": 500
}

Example: Find All CSX Accidents Nationwide Since 2020

{
    "railroad": "CSX Transportation",
    "startYear": 2020,
    "maxResults": 1000
}

Pricing

This Actor uses a pay-per-result pricing model:

Cost Type	Price
Per Actor start	$0.00005
Per result	$0.002

Example costs:

• 100 accident records: ~$0.20
• 1,000 accident records: ~$2.00
• 10,000 accident records: ~$20.00

You also pay standard Apify platform compute costs on top of Actor pricing.

Input Parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
state	string	No	(all)	Two-letter state code (e.g., TX, CA)
railroad	string	No	(all)	Railroad name filter (partial match, e.g., Union Pacific)
startYear	integer	No	(any)	Start year (1975-2030)
endYear	integer	No	(any)	End year (1975-2030)
accidentType	string	No	(all)	Accident type (e.g., Derailment, Collision)
minDamageCost	integer	No	(none)	Minimum total damage cost in dollars
maxResults	integer	No	100	Maximum results to return (1-200,000)

Output Example

{
    "reportingRailroadCode": "UP",
    "reportingRailroadName": "Union Pacific Railroad Company",
    "accidentNumber": "0723GC025",
    "year": 2023,
    "date": "2023-07-17T00:00:00.000",
    "time": "6:10 PM",
    "accidentTypeCode": "11",
    "accidentType": "Fire/violent rupture",
    "stateCode": "48",
    "stateAbbr": "TX",
    "stateName": "TEXAS",
    "countyName": "VICTORIA",
    "station": "VICTORIA",
    "milepost": "221.0",
    "latitude": 28.805,
    "longitude": -96.985,
    "temperature": 89.0,
    "visibility": "Dusk",
    "weatherCondition": "Clear",
    "trackType": "Yard",
    "trackClass": "1",
    "trainDirection": "South",
    "trainSpeed": 10,
    "maximumSpeed": 10,
    "grossTonnage": 1394,
    "headendLocomotives": 1,
    "loadedFreightCars": 10,
    "loadedPassengerCars": 0,
    "equipmentDamageCost": 50000,
    "trackDamageCost": 0,
    "totalDamageCost": 50000,
    "primaryAccidentCauseCode": "E74L",
    "primaryAccidentCause": "Electrically caused fire (LOCOMOTIVE)",
    "railroadEmployeesKilled": 0,
    "railroadEmployeesInjured": 0,
    "passengersKilled": 0,
    "passengersInjured": 0,
    "othersKilled": 0,
    "othersInjured": 0,
    "totalPersonsKilled": 0,
    "totalPersonsInjured": 0,
    "hazmatCars": 0,
    "hazmatReleasedCars": 0,
    "narrative": "AT 6:10 PM A FIRE WAS REPORTED ON A LOCOMOTIVE...",
    "reportUrl": "https://safetydata.fra.dot.gov/Officeofsafety/Publicsite/FORM54/F54Report.aspx?..."
}

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FAQ

How current is the data? The FRA updates the Socrata dataset regularly. Most recent data is typically available within a few months of the incident date.

Can I get data for all states at once? Yes. Leave the State field empty to retrieve accidents from all U.S. states and territories.

What accident types are available? Common types include: Derailment, Hwy-rail crossing, Collision, Fire/violent rupture, Obstruction, Explosion, and Other. Leave the filter empty to get all types.

Why are some records missing latitude/longitude? Older records (especially pre-2000) may have coordinates set to 0.0 or missing. This is a limitation of the source data.

What is the narrative field? Some accident records include a free-text description of the incident. Not all records have narratives — they are more common for serious incidents.

Can I filter by multiple states? The current version supports one state at a time. To get data for multiple states, run the Actor multiple times with different state codes.

Legal Disclaimer

This Actor extracts publicly available data from the U.S. Department of Transportation's open data portal (data.transportation.gov). This is public government data made freely available under open data initiatives. The data is provided "as is" without warranty. Users are responsible for ensuring their use of the data complies with applicable laws and regulations. This Actor does not access any restricted, private, or authenticated data sources.

For questions or support, contact the Actor author through the Apify Store.