In 2022, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) contracted with Transportation Technology Center, Inc. (TTCI) to conduct validation studies of CIVA software’s rail models for hand-held, angled beam, shear vertical wave (SW) inspections. The research team generated side-drilled holes (SDHs) at different depths in a carbon steel block and in a rail sample to establish a ground truth. They then conducted laboratory-based ultrasonic testing (UT) scans and theoretical simulation studies for both of these test samples. The scans and subsequent simulation demonstrated that, for the most part, the modeling results were in good agreement with the experimental results for the 70 and 45 degree SW inspections. However, the modeling results did not match the experimental results for the 45 degree SW inspections in a steel block with SDHs at depths from 60 mm to 80 mm.