Management Report: Safety and Risk Management in Railway Accidents

This report delves into the critical aspects of safety and risk management within the railway sector, emphasizing the imperative of safeguarding workers and stakeholders from potential uncertainties. It acknowledges that while eliminating risks entirely is unfeasible, mitigating their impact is paramount. The report provides a detailed examination of safety management principles and analyzes the devastating 2015 Philadelphia train derailment as a case study, outlining the accident's causes, including safety breaches and human errors. It discusses the aftermath of the incident, including policy changes and the implementation of action plans to prevent future accidents. The report underscores the significance of proactive measures in identifying and addressing potential hazards to foster a secure working environment, emphasizing the importance of continuous monitoring, evaluation, and the adoption of preventive strategies to minimize the likelihood of such catastrophic events.

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Safety and Risk Management
Report
Student
9/5/2019

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Executive Summary
Safety and risk management is a major managerial responsibility conducted to protect the
workers and other stakeholders form future uncertainties. Such events cannot be eliminated but
its impacts can be avoided to some extent. Like various other industries, railway sectors have
also adopted the process to take preventive measures. Despite that major collision has happened
in the past, which had caused major disasters and created havoc. Through the report, insights
regarding the accident will be provided and what factors lead to the frightening event will also be
discussed in the report.

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Contents
Introduction............................................................................................................................................3
Safety and Risk Management................................................................................................................3
Safety Management Principles..........................................................................................................4
Train accidents.......................................................................................................................................4
Case Study: “2015 Philadelphia train derailment”............................................................................5
Safety Breach.....................................................................................................................................6
Aftermath and changes in policy.......................................................................................................7
Implementation of Action Plan to prevent Human errors and faults which can lead to fatal
accidents..................................................................................................................................8
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................9
Bibliography........................................................................................................................................10

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Introduction
Today safety has become the highest priority for the organizations and timely monitoring
the hazards and unforeseen contingencies have become critical for companies to create a safe and
secure environment for the workforce. However, there are certain risks, which can be only
minimized but cannot be eradicated from the system, which can lead to disaster and major
accidents. Such kind accident is observed in rail transport, where in spite of various preventive
measures accident happened (Miller, 2011). In the report, the brief description of the safety and
management has been given, following the precise information regarding the rail accident2015
Philadelphia train derailment” has been provided.
Safety and Risk Management
Safety means a state where the scope of hazards or risk is limited to a particular level. It
is practiced at every level of an organization to protect human resources from adverse events.
Safety management is a commitment made to prevent injuries in the workplace. It is defined as a
structure of determining the degree of risks and preventive measures can be adopted to minimize
those risks (Reportable and recordable, 2013). It is a management function as it identifies the
prevalence of the risk, conduct the timely evaluation of such risk and use preventive measures.
Safety management arises from a sense of leadership. In safety management leadership, the
responsibility has been put over the senior-level managers who determine and direct the
employees. He practices the safety culture through routine checkups and interacting with the
employees, identifying the error and flaws in the system (Bowman, 2015).

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Risk management means reducing the hazards and risks from the system for efficient and
effective performance. However, OHS (Occupational Health Safety has contradictory thoughts,
as the risk can be positive as well as negative. While explaining the nature of risk, it stated, that
the risk where is occurring in the workplace can lead to adverse events. Whereas, the risk which
undertaken investment in any new venture can lead to positive outcomes. To provide a safe
working culture safety and risk management are practiced together (Miller, 2011).
Safety Management Principles
For the efficient management of risk, there are certain principles, which are followed so
that errors and faults can be monitored before time and timely actions can be undertaken to avoid
accidents or disasters. Despite numerous efforts, accidents and misfortune incidents do occur and
its major impacts can be observed through the case study discussed below.
Train accidents
Rail transportation has followed various methods to conduct safety and risk management.
However, Train collision occurs when two trains traveling on the same railway track collide and
smash into one another. Like this, there are multiple reasons, which contribute to the occurrence
of rail accidents like, trail derailment (Reportable and recordable, 2013). Train derailments occur
when the trains runway through its rail bars due to technical issues and security faults. It can also
happen due to unforeseen natural calamities like landslides, which can block the path of trains.
Generally, such mishappening cannot be prevented as the operators and the drivers are not able
to identify the risk and take timely precautions.

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These types of accidents have gruesome impacts over not only the passengers and
railway employees but also destroy the beauty of the environment (International Civil Defence
Organization , 2019). Besides this time running can also say as one of the major causes of rail
accidents. In the transportation terms, Time running means working according to the train
schedules so that passengers can reach their destination on time. From the safety of the
passengers to effective performance, everything is included in time running. However, to reach
on time many drivers usually neglect the safety of the passengers. Such unethical practices can
cause adverse events in which an event leads to the loss of life and major incidents (Klockner &
Toft, 2018). Such an accident can be described through a frightening experience “2015
Philadelphia train derailment” where the Amtrak Northeast Regional train was wrecked on the
Northeast Passage in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Nicol, 2015).
Case Study: “2015 Philadelphia train derailment”
Figure 1

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Source: (Gonzales , 2017)
On the busy morning of 12 May 2015, an Amtrak Northeast Regional train was departed
from Washington D.C. for Penn station( Pennsylvania) New York city ran off the railway tracks
and smashed on the North Corridor in the Port Richmond close to the area of Philadelphia
Pennsylvania. In the terrible disaster, out of the total 238 travelers and 5 railway workers, eight
people lost their lives and many people were severely injured. It was discovered that, at the time
of the derailment, the train was moving on the curved railway track with a speed of 102 mph
(164 km/h) in a 50 mph (80 km/h) (Mcdonald, 2015). It was a sudden incident, as the driver did
not get the chance to reduce the speed of the train, as it was too late. According to the federal
authorities, the train was traveling at 106 miles an hour, which was more than its actual speed
before it became off track. There was blood everywhere and the survivors describe the whole
incident as a mess (Health & Medicine Week, 2018). While sharing their experience, survivors
told that the travellers were thrown against the wall as well as the furniture, and luggage was
falling over and hitting the horrified passengers ( Bhattacharya, et al., Anup K. Bhattacharya).
Safety Breach
As per the report published by the National Transportation Safety Board, the major
reason for the train derailment was that the loco Pilot of Amtrak Northeast Regional train got
diverted by the on-going radio broadcast due to which he lost his control and focus over the path.
The panel further stated that through the Positive Train Control, such a situation could have been
avoided, as it is an automatic system of managing the speed. In the investigation report, it was
identified the train had not installed ATC in the system, which would have limited its speed on
the curvy track and the mishappening was avoided (Gonzales , 2017).

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While comparing the accident with rail misfortune, which occurred in 1987, Russ
Quimby, a retired train accident investigator exclaimed that when the management becomes
more dependent on the employees, there would be a high probability of errors and faults. Rail
Safety professionals indicated that Amtrak train engineers had multiple options to alert the train
workers regarding the over speeding of the train, through emergency lights and sirens. To
analyses the cause of such collision, officers investigated various factors like the conditions of
railway tracks, the operating system of the rail and even interrogated engine drivers and workers.
The fact, which was disclosed through the inquiry, was that Bostian, the train driver was a
qualified and competent employee. It was found that the diver was not under the influence of a
kind of liquor or drugs.
Moreover, it was discovered that the limit of the speed on the curvy track is
50m.p.h.however the figures collected from the black box was indicated that during the wreck
the train was moving with the speed of 106 m.p.h. This lead to the over speed on the curvy point
(Railway Age, 2015).
Aftermath and changes in policy
After the turmoil and horrifying event, the services to the passenger was shut down for
some time, which has created chaos and issues for business passengers and other people. It
raised concern for the government officials, over which immediate debate was conducted to
solve the prevailing issues. The debate and discussion were undertaken over the infrastructure of
train and overall railway system. The House Appropriations Committee prohibited the funds for
the improvement of Amtrak. Previous Congressman Patrick Murphy, who was present on the

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frightful journey, stated that it was havoc. There was blood all around, the entire train was
shaking, and people were badly hurt ( Bhattacharya, et al., Anup K. Bhattacharya).
This incident carried forward to the court proceedings in which, railway engineer Bradon
Bostian was convicted and charged over 200 allegations in May 2015 in the train derailment
case. He was charged for causing tragedy, breaching the safety rules and recklessly endangering
the lives of many passengers, and for conducting the activities in an unethical way. However, the
judge dismissed the accusations and other charges over the engineer. During the hearing, Justice
Barbara McDermott of the common law court of Philadelphia indicated that it was an accident
rather than a criminal offense, as the error and fault are not made deliberately ( Zaveri , 2019).
As per the news published by the Association press, the magistrate also said, “We all are
human.” After the hearing and long period of debate and fight, Amtrak agreed to compensate the
$265 million to all the victims and the families of the people who passed away in the tragic
incident as a settlement. It was one of the highest and expensive compensation of its times
(International Railway Journal, 2016).
Implementation of Action Plan to prevent Human errors and faults which can lead to
fatal accidents.
1. To reduce the accidental rate, FRA an organization of the US department of
transportation has introduced several guidelines on the consumption of liquor or drugs by
the railway workers. It involves routine testing of the engineers before and after
conducting the operations (US Department of Tranportation , 2019).
2. FRA has introduced “ close calls” which is used to alert for the upcoming unsafe events.
It does not lead to immediate reporting, but make the people and railway authorities
aware regarding the future contingencies (Nicol, 2015).

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Conclusion
It can be concluded that maintaining safety and risk management has become a need for
companies as future contingencies and hazards can be avoided on time. It has become critical for
preventing errors and faults so that employees can work in a safe and secure environment.
However such kind of risk can be prevented to a particular degree. Its impacts have been
explained through realistic examples.

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Bibliography
Bhattacharya, A. K., Fenerty, S., Awan, O. A., Hershey, B., Cohen, G., Jonnalagadda, P., et al.
(Anup K. Bhattacharya). Imaging Patterns of Injuries After the 2015 Amtrak Philadelphia
Train Derailment. American Journal of Roentgenology, 948-961.
Zaveri , M. (2019, July 23). Second Judge Dismisses Criminal Charges in Philadelphia Train
Wreck That Killed 8. Retrieved 2019, from The New York Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/23/us/brandon-bostian-amtrak.html
Bowman, R. (2015). Safety and risk management.(Message from the President). Railway Track
and Structures, 36.
Gonzales , R. (2017, May 12). Amtrak Engineer Charged In Deadly 2015 Philadelphia Train
Crash. Retrieved 2019, from National Public Radio :
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/05/12/528206181/amtrak-engineer-
charged-in-deadly-2015-philadelphia-train-crash
Health & Medicine Week. (2018). Studies from Temple University Update Current Data on
Roentgenology (Imaging Patterns of Injuries After the 2015 Amtrak Philadelphia Train
Derailment). Health & Medicine Week, 5072.
International Civil Defence Organization . (2019). Railway. Retrieved 2019, from International
Civil Defence Organization:
http://www.icdo.org/en/disasters/man-made-disasters/transport-accidents/railway/