Date of incident: December 2016
Notice of incident number: 2016112010018
Employers: Railway maintenance company; railway operating company

Incident summary
In a busy switch yard (rail yard), a three-person crew was cleaning snow off switch points (the moving parts of switches). The crew leader left the work party. Before he left, he told one worker to be on the lookout for trains. The two remaining workers continued to work on snow removal. A train struck one of the workers, causing serious injuries.

Investigation conclusions

Cause

• Failure to follow established safety procedures. The three-person crew was required to appoint one worker to watch for trains while working on the tracks. When the crew was reduced to two workers, although one worker had been appointed watchperson, neither of the workers stopped the snow removal task to act as a safety watch. As a result, a train approached unnoticed and one of the workers was struck by the moving train.

Contributing factors

• Inadequate communication by supervisor. At the time of the incident, the work area was unsupervised. Although one worker was told to be on the lookout for trains, they did not act as a safety watch and failed to see the approaching train. Better communication of expectations by the crew leader might have prevented the incident from occurring.
• Conductor delayed alerting engineer. The conductor of the train was aware of the work crew on the tracks in front of the train’s intended path of travel. The conductor assumed the work crew had posted a safety watch and that the crew would clear the tracks in time for the train to pass. When the conductor realized that the work crew was not going to clear the tracks, he radioed the engineer, who initiated the emergency stop, but it was too late to stop the train.

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