How Did a Boat Cause a TRAIN DERAILMENT?

On September 22, 1993, an Amtrak passenger train, the Sunset Limited, derailed while crossing the Big Bayou Canot bridge in Alabama, USA. The train was travelling from Los Angeles to Miami when it suddenly came off the tracks and plunged into the water. Earlier that night, a tugboat pushing a barge had accidentally struck the bridge. The pilot of the tugboat, who was unfamiliar with the river and navigating in foggy conditions, mistakenly turned into Big Bayou Canot instead of the main river channel. He had no radar and didn’t realize he had hit the bridge. The impact displaced the bridge by about three feet but did not completely collapse it. When the Sunset Limited, moving at 70 mph, crossed the bridge, the shifted tracks caused it to derail. Several cars plunged into the bayou, and others piled up on the collapsed section. All photo and video footage is used under fair use law CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Cylinder Four and CGI Snake by Chris Zabriskie is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Source: http://chriszabriskie.com/cylinders/ Artist: http://chriszabriskie.com/