Boltar wrote
long before ambulance chasers came on the scene.

So if heavy rain causes an embankment to collapse onto the track just as
a train is coming around the corner which then derails then who is to
blame?

See, for example
http://www.raib.gov.uk/cms_resources...f_Cruachan.pdf

In the general case, Network Rail didn't inspect the embankment or maintain
the drainage properly. There are cases where the cause was down to an
adjoining landowner, and there have been recommendations that planning rules
should be changed so that Network Rail is notified (and can object to)
engineering operations near the railway which might affect drainage.

Peter