A derail or derailer is a device used to prevent fouling (blocking or compromising) of a rail track (or collision with anything present on the track, such as a person, or a train) by unauthorized movements of trains or unattended rolling stock.[1] The device works by derailing the equipment as it rolls over or through it.
Although accidental derailment is damaging to equipment and track, and requires considerable time and expense to remedy, derails are used in situations where there is a risk of greater damage to equipment, injury or death if equipment is allowed to proceed past the derail point.
- ^ Kellenberger 1919, p. 208.