Dispatching or Signaling

Over the years, many railway accidents have occurred in the area of dispatching or signaling because of errors made by dispatchers or signalmen. Fortunately, the application of modem technical devices has helped to significantly reduce e occurrence of human error. Additional information on this topic is available in Anderson [7]. 

4 Railway Personnel Error-Prone Tasks and Error-Contributing Factors in Railway Operations 

Railway personnel carry out a wide variety of tasks in their day-to-day work environment. All of these tasks are subject to human error, but past experience indicates that some of these tasks are more prone to human error than others. Some of the day-to-day tasks carried out by railway persoimel that 

There are many error-contributing factors in railway operations. A study of seven Canadian and U.S. Class 1 freight railroads and several regional roads, concerning all Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) reportable train-related accidents conducted over a period of six months, reported 67 accidents/incidents [2, 3]. Six of these accidents/incidents were studied further with respect to the factors that contribute to the occurrence of errors. 

The study highlighted 36 factors that most likely contributed to the occurrence of these six accidents/incidents. These error-contributing factors were categorized under the following four classifications [3]  

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