Four people were injured,including the driver of the train who was trapped in the front carriage after it derailed and overturned.
Allan Martin Simpson,47,was arrested in the Wollongong suburb of Dapto about 1.30pm on Wednesday after police last week made a public appeal to find him.
He was taken to Lake Illawarra police station,where he was charged with stealing a car,two counts of destroying or damaging property,larceny,driving while disqualified,endangering safety of a person on a railway,obstruction to railway locomotive and entering enclosed land without lawful excuse.
The incident occurred about 4am on October 20 on West Dapto Road at Kembla Grange,with emergency services freeing 13 passengers and crew members from the train.
Police said the train struck an unoccupied van,which they allege had been abandoned on the track,before the front carriage of the train rolled onto its side.
During an examination of the crime scene,officers from Lake Illawarra Police District located a go-kart on a trolley in the rail corridor and a large hole in the security fence between the corridor and a raceway. Police allege the van left on the tracks had been stolen earlier that morning from a home at Flinders,in Shellharbour.
Mr Simpson was refused bail to appear at Wollongong Local Court on Thursday.
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