Great Western Coffee Shop

'Railway worker' struck by train at Hayes station

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Rail drama: The incident occurred near Hayes and Harlington station

A man is in hospital after being hit by a train near Hayes and Harlington station this morning.

The unnamed victim, who police believe is a member of railway staff, was taken away with head and arm injuries.

A British Transport Police (BTP) spokeswoman said: ^Officers from BTP and Metropolitan Police attended the incident, which was reported to BTP at 10.40am and is currently being treated as non-suspicious.^

Police said the man^s injuries are not thought to be life-threatening.

First Great Western, which operates trains through Hayes and Harlington, initially struggled with delayed services after the incident, but is now reporting normal service.

Serious accident to a track worker, near West Drayton, London Borough of Hillingdon, 22 March 2013
 

The RAIB is investigating a serious accident which occurred on a four track section of the Great Western main Line, near West Drayton, approximately 12^ miles west of London Paddington, on Friday 22 March 2013.

At around 10:37 hrs, the 09:07 hrs First Great Western service from Oxford to London Paddington was passing between West Drayton and Hayes & Harlington when it struck and seriously injured a track worker. The worker was employed through a labour agency and was part of a group undertaking survey work on or near railway lines which remained open to traffic. His role at the time of the accident was that of ^intermediate lookout^.

The role of the intermediate lookout was to observe a ^distant lookout^ and pass on any warnings of approaching trains to a ^site lookout^ positioned with the people undertaking work on or near the line. When undertaking these duties he was required to look for westbound trains while standing in a position of safety at all times.


 
Accident site at West Drayton



The RAIB^s investigation will consider the sequence of events that led to the accident and the factors that caused the intermediate lookout to undertake his duties when standing too close to the line used by eastbound trains. It will also review the planning of the work, its management on site, training and competency.

Learning points
42 The RAIB has decided not to conduct a full investigation as it does not believe that an investigation would identify new safety learning. However, the accident illustrates the importance of applying existing safety knowledge, particularly the learning points given below:

a) Network Rail and other organisations engaged in activities involving work on the railway are advised, as part of their routine briefings, to remind their staff that:
- railway staff working on or near the line must focus on the task in hand and not be distracted by other thoughts or use of a mobile phone. If any staff feel that they cannot concentrate on this task, they must move to a position of safety and tell the person in charge that they cannot do the job safely and ask to be relieved; and
- when acting as a COSS, even when instructing an experienced co-worker, a full briefing must be given to everyone to give assurance that people are aware of the safe system of work and have fully engaged with implementing it; and
- while on or near the line, track workers must acknowledge any warning given by an approaching train so that the driver is better able to judge
whether there is a need to sound an additional urgent warning.

b) Train operating companies are advised, as part of their routine briefings, to remind all drivers that:
- when sounding warnings to people on or near the line, they should pay particular attention to lookouts and other staff who may be remote from a
main group; warnings should start with a blast on the high and the low tone horn (in the loud setting where soft or loud settings are provided), followed by short sharp blasts where no acknowledgement is received or the track worker remains in a dangerous position; and
- train drivers approaching track workers in areas of curved track should appreciate that it can be difficult to see whether these people are in a position of safety until they are close to the individual concerned. If there is any doubt a warning should be sounded.

c) Train operators should endeavour to improve the availability and quality of forward and rear facing closed circuit television recordings because this assists in the evidence gathering needed for safety learning.