Railroad injury statistics by railroad
Railroad injury statistics from the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA): from 2021 to 2025, the 17 railroads on this site reported 14,000 on-duty employee casualties (injuries and illnesses), and 36 of them were deaths.
- Employee casualties, 2021 to 2025
- 14,000
- Deaths
- 36
- Railroads counted
- 17
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These are raw counts from the reports railroads file with the FRA. They are not adjusted for how many people each railroad employs, and they are not counts of cancer cases.
Employee injuries and illnesses by railroad
 Amtrak | 3,294 | 1 | 556 | 602 | 669 | 736 | 731 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 BNSF | 1,635 | 9 | 336 | 393 | 311 | 328 | 267 |
| Caltrain | 38 | 0 | not reported | 5 | 16 | 12 | 5 |
 Canadian National | 392 | 1 | 86 | 83 | 77 | 66 | 80 |
 Conrail | 75 | 0 | 15 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 18 |
 CPKC | 299 | 0 | 37 | 43 | 61 | 79 | 79 |
 CSX | 966 | 6 | 175 | 193 | 178 | 240 | 180 |
 Kansas City Southern | 139 | 0 | 58 | 71 | 10 | not reported | not reported |
| LIRR | 1,870 | 0 | 380 | 412 | 382 | 373 | 323 |
| MBTA | 246 | 1 | 30 | 41 | 49 | 55 | 71 |
| Metra | 254 | 0 | 52 | 42 | 45 | 56 | 59 |
| Metro-North | 788 | 0 | 163 | 175 | 160 | 143 | 147 |
| Metrolink | 94 | 0 | 31 | 13 | 19 | 15 | 16 |
| NJ Transit | 676 | 0 | 137 | 139 | 122 | 130 | 148 |
 Norfolk Southern | 1,107 | 4 | 230 | 199 | 230 | 247 | 201 |
| SEPTA | 478 | 0 | 99 | 83 | 83 | 100 | 113 |
 Union Pacific | 1,649 | 14 | 364 | 368 | 395 | 299 | 223 |
| All 17 railroads | 14,000 | 36 | 2,749 | 2,875 | 2,821 | 2,894 | 2,661 |
Amtrak and the commuter railroads appear here as employers: the counts are their own on-duty employees, not passengers.
Merged and shared railroads
Each FRA report carries one reporting railroad code, and each code is counted in one row only, so no report is counted twice in the totals. Kansas City Southern filed its own reports until it merged into CPKC in 2023; after that its crews report under CPKC, so the Kansas City Southern row shows "not reported" for 2024 and 2025. The CPKC row adds the reports filed as Canadian Pacific before the merger. Canadian National counts its United States railroads (Illinois Central, Wisconsin Central and Grand Trunk Western). Conrail files for its own crews, apart from CSX and Norfolk Southern, which own it. Union Pacific includes the crews it runs on Metra lines, while the Metra row counts Metra's own employees. Caltrain has no reports under its own code for 2021.
Employee injuries and illnesses by railroad job
| Job group | 2021 to 2025 | Illness reports | Deaths |
|---|---|---|---|
| Conductors, engineers, brakemen, switchmen and yardmasters | 6,049 | 364 | 25 |
| Machinists, boilermakers, sheet metal workers and mechanics | 862 | 101 | 0 |
| Carmen | 759 | 74 | 1 |
| Trackmen, laborers and track welders | 1,724 | 121 | 5 |
| Electricians | 511 | 66 | 0 |
| Signalmen and signal maintainers | 650 | 60 | 0 |
These six groups cover the FRA job codes our job pages use (10,555 of the 14,000 reports), so they add up to less than the railroad total.
Year by year, railroad by railroad
Each small line shows one railroad's yearly count from 2021 to 2025, on its own scale, so the shape matters and not the height. A gap means no reports were filed under that railroad's code that year. The railroad table above gives every number.
Amtrak
2021: 556 · 2025: 731
BNSF
2021: 336 · 2025: 267
Caltrain
2022: 5 · 2025: 5
Canadian National
2021: 86 · 2025: 80
Conrail
2021: 15 · 2025: 18
CPKC
2021: 37 · 2025: 79
CSX
2021: 175 · 2025: 180
Kansas City Southern
2021: 58 · 2023: 10
LIRR
2021: 380 · 2025: 323
MBTA
2021: 30 · 2025: 71
Metra
2021: 52 · 2025: 59
Metro-North
2021: 163 · 2025: 147
Metrolink
2021: 31 · 2025: 16
NJ Transit
2021: 137 · 2025: 148
Norfolk Southern
2021: 230 · 2025: 201
SEPTA
2021: 99 · 2025: 113
Union Pacific
2021: 364 · 2025: 223
How these numbers are counted
The FRA defines casualties as reportable deaths, injuries, or illnesses that arise from operating a railroad. Railroads report each one on Form FRA F 6180.55a. These counts include only railroad employees on duty, and the people counted are the reporting railroad's own employees. Under 49 CFR 225.19, an employee case is reported when it leads to medical treatment, a day away from work, restricted duty, or death. The counts are not adjusted for workforce size or hours worked, so a bigger railroad will show more reports. They are not evidence of cancer, which is usually found years after the exposure and rarely reported here. The FRA keeps adding late and amended reports, so the latest year can still change.
Download the CSV by railroad · Download the CSV by job. Source: FRA, Injury/Illness Summary, Casualty Data (Form 55a), on data.transportation.gov. Free to reuse. Please name the Federal Railroad Administration as the source; a link back to this page is appreciated.
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