ASHBY, Neb. — A tornado is being blamed for derailing an empty BNSF coal train on Sunday evening (April 27, 2025) near the town of Ashby, News Channel Nebraska reports.
The derailment was reported about 6:27 p.m. CT, and involved the derailment of about 130 cars. The lead locomotive was not affected, and the two crew members on board were reportedly uninjured. Photographs show at least two locomotives at the rear of the train were overturned.
An updated BNSF advisory to customers places the incident about 50 miles southeast of Alliance, Neb., on its Sand Hills Subdivision, and reports the line was reopened about 5:32 p.m. on Monday.
At least five tornadoes were reported in the region on Sunday, as well as 3-inch-diamater hail, the news site reports.
— Updated at April 29 at 7:04 a.m. CT with reopening of rail line.
Alan Jones
As stated the train was derailed by a large wedge tornado.
If you search the internet there is very good video of it. Putting in “Nebraska Sandhills wedge tornado” of that date will do the trick.
Do the video cameras operate on locos when operating in DPU. It will be interesting if they do and are released by BNSF.
If the locomotive is equipped, cameras operate continuously. Whether they choose to download the video data is optional, but I think that they would. Releasing it publicly is another matter.
Typically if the NTSB is investigating, the videos will be made public. If there is no regulatory follow up then probably not.
The videos of the derail site were interesting, there were still a bunch of hail on the highway shoulders, at first it looked like snow.
I am curious if BNSF Operations keeps an active weather map up on one of the large screens with an overlays of current consists.
I know that they won’t stop for just any bad weather, but if tornadic activity is going to be in the area crossing a mainline, then I would think they would hold the traffic briefly.
Now turning over 2 locos that is something. Were the cars loaded or empty?
“empty coal train”
oops missed that it was empty
Sometimes you can’t avoid Mother Nature.
A powerful, fearsome tornado measuring over 1.6 km (1 mile) wide…
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