A 21-year-old Stoughton man was seriously injured Wednesday afternoon after a train slammed into the driver’s side of his car at a railroad crossing in the Town of Fulton, where the only traffic controls were a pair of stop signs. Firefighters had to extricate him from the wreck, and he was flown to a hospital by Med Flight. The train’s three-person crew walked away unhurt.
According to wmtv15news.com, the crash happened around 2:45 p.m. on North Dallman Road, just south of County Trunk N. The man was driving a Honda Civic north on North Dallman Road and approaching the railroad crossing when a train made up of one locomotive and two freight cars, operated by a 51-year-old man from McFarland, was also nearing the intersection. The Civic continued over the tracks and was struck on the driver’s side as it crossed, the station reported.
No Gates, Just Stop Signs
The sheriff’s office said the only traffic control at the crossing consisted of stop signs posted both north and south of the tracks, and that they were in proper working order at the time of the crash, per the same account. There were no gates or flashing lights reported at this location. Firefighters extricated the injured driver from his vehicle before he was transported to the hospital via Med Flight, the station reported. The train’s three crew members had no reported injuries.
The crash remains under investigation, and the evidence available does not indicate the driver’s account of what happened, whether his vehicle stopped at the signs, or the train’s speed at the time of impact.
A Pattern Seen Statewide
Crossings without gates or flashing signals are where most Wisconsin train crashes happen. A majority of train crashes in the state occur at so-called passive crossings lacking those safety features, according to TMJ4, which reported that Wisconsin saw 40 train crashes in one recent year and that two-thirds of them happened at passive crossings. In 2024 alone, 32 railroad grade-crossing incidents in Wisconsin killed four people and injured seven, according to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation.
The Town of Fulton has drawn state scrutiny over crossing safety before. A two-year investigation launched in October 2020 led the Wisconsin Office of the Commissioner of Railroads to order that a Wisconsin & Southern Railroad crossing at County M in the Town of Fulton be upgraded with a standard crossing gate and 12-inch lighted LED warning flashers, according to hngnews.com. That outlet reported the upgrade could cost the railroad $170,000 and noted that about four trains a day use that crossing, with the state estimating at least 4,000 potential vehicle-train conflicts there daily. It is not established whether that upgrade involved the same crossing where Wednesday’s crash occurred. The Wisconsin Office of the Commissioner of Railroads holds primary responsibility for determining whether warning devices at crossings statewide are adequate, according to the agency.
Not an Isolated Incident
Similar collisions have surfaced elsewhere in the region this year. In August, a car crashed into a moving train in Sun Prairie at a crossing without arms, wmtv15news.com reported separately. In Iowa, a driver was seriously injured when a vehicle and train collided in Polk County, according to KCCI. Railroads are required to report any impact between on-track equipment and highway users to the Federal Railroad Administration, per data.transportation.gov. As of now, investigators have not released further details on what led to Wednesday’s crash in the Town of Fulton.
