Past tense of derail
regular verb
The past tense of derail is derailed. The past participle is also derailed.
Forms of derail
| Base form (V1) | derail /ˌdiːˈɹeɪl/ |
|---|---|
| Past tense (V2) | derailed |
| Past participle (V3) | derailed |
| Present participle | derailing |
| Third person singular | derails |
Derailed in a sentence
- The train was destroyed when it was derailed by the collision.
- The conversation derailed once James brought up politics.
- Ten of the freight train's wagons had derailed, two of them foul of the Down Fast.2026 March 18, Greg Morse, “1996 crash driving freight reforms”, in RAIL, number 1057, page 50. From the entry jack-knife
- These tubs when derailed had to be lifted on with sheer brute strength.2010, Derek Hollows, Voices in the Dark: Pony Talk and Mining Tales, page 79. From the entry braffin
- But Labor can take a leaf from Dutton’s book, given the degree to which “delulu” derailed his campaign.2025 May 8, Jacob Greber, “How Peter Dutton’s Wile E Coyote campaign flew off the cliff”, in ABC News. From the entry delulu
Meaning of derail
- noun Synonym of derailer: A device placed on railway tracks in order to cause a train to derail.
- noun An instance of diverting a conversation or debate from its original topic.
- verb To cause to come off the tracks.
Questions about the past tense of derail
- What is the past tense of derail?
- The past tense of derail is derailed.
- What is the past participle of derail?
- The past participle of derail is derailed.
- Is derail a regular or irregular verb?
- Derail is a regular verb: its past tense adds -ed.
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: derail (page history and authors) and the entries of its forms. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws left out forms marked obsolete, archaic, rare or dialectal and added the examples. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this page: “Past tense of derail.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/past-tense/derail. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.