9 ANNUAL REPORT 2018 Report Notice No person may produce, reproduce or transmit in any form or by any means this report or any part thereof without the express permission of the CRR. This report may be freely used for educational purposes. Any enquiries about this publication should be sent using contact details below. Contact Details Website www.crr.ie Address Commission for Railway Regulation, Temple House, Email [email protected] Blackrock, Phone +353 1 2068110 County Dublin, Ireland Prepared By: Anthony Byrne Approved By: Brian Higgisson The CRR is grateful to Neil Dinnen for permission to use their copyright images in this report Foreword The Commission for Railway Regulation is pleased to publish its Annual Safety Performance Report for 2019. This report supplements the CRR’s Annual Report to the Minister and provides further detail on the safety performance of the railway organisations operating in Ireland. This is the eleventh year that the Annual Safety The collection of the data for this report was conducted Performance Review has been issued. The CRR against the backdrop of COVID 19 and the associated continuously supervise the safety performance of the restrictions put in place. The CRR acknowledges the principal railway organisations operating in the state. assistance of all who have provided the data that has This is done through our Inspectors undertaking audits, allowed us produce this report and so continue one of inspections and meeting with company executives and our key mandates of encouraging and fostering railway managers, to check they are applying and improving safety. their safety management systems. Anthony Byrne The primary function of our railways (inc. tramways) Principal Inspector – Supervision & Enforcement is the transportation of people and/or freight safely. In that context passenger numbers on both the Irish Rail network and Luas Tramway saw sizeable increases in 2019 with Irish Rail exceeding 50 million passenger journeys for the first time in its history. Against this backdrop, there were no passenger fatalities on our railways in 2019 and the safety performance of the Irish railway sector was stable. 1 Executive Summary This annual safety performance report of the Commission for Railway Regulation (CRR) is prepared for stakeholders and the general public in line with Section 10 of the Railway Safety Act 2005. The data used to compile this report is provided to us periodically throughout the year by the various railway organisations. This report aggregates this data and compares year on year performance together with commentary on several safety performance indicators. The CRR is the independent railway safety regulator in of road traffic collisions between road vehicles and the Republic of Ireland and is responsible for overseeing trams and pedestrian contact with tram events. It the safety of all railway organisations, which in 2019, should be noted, however, that all road traffic collisions included Iarnród Éireann, Transdev (Luas Operator), were as a result of the road vehicle driver breaking a Balfour Beatty Rail Ireland (BBRI), Rhomberg Sersa red traffic light and colliding with the tram. Similarly, Ireland, Bord Na Móna (where their railway interfaces pedestrian contact with tram occurrences are, for the with public roads), the Railway Preservation Society of most part, due to people being distracted and stepping Ireland (RPSI) and a number of smaller heritage railways. of footpaths into the path of approaching trams. The safety performance of the Irish railway sector Looking wider to Europe, Ireland continues to perform is broadly positive, both when compared against well in terms of the number of accidents, however, previous years and European statistics, and against a Ireland performs less well when it comes to precursor continuing increase in passenger journeys and train/ events such as Signals Passed at Danger (SPADs), tram kilometres travelled. wrong-side signalling failures, and broken rails. There were no passenger fatalities in 2019. However, In 2019, the RAIU concluded 3 investigations and 1 tragically there were seven fatal occurrences on the trend investigation. These followed a wrongside door national heavy and light rail networks, two fewer than failure at Ashtown Station on the 12th August 2018, a in the preceding two years but nonetheless seven too train collision with a buffer Stop in a maintenance depot many. Five of these occurred on the Iarnród Éireann on the 17th July 2018, the collision of a road vehicle network and two on the LUAS Tramway in Dublin. There with a train at level crossing XM220 on the 17th August were no reports of deaths at level crossings. 2018 and a trend investigation into several dangerous occurrences involving Road Rail Vehicles between 2015- In Iarnród Éireann, 2019 saw a continued reduction 2018. in the number of train collisions, particularly with obstacles on the line. Signals Passed At Danger (SPADs) This resulted in 34 new safety recommendations, decreased slightly to 12 in 2019, one fewer than in 2018. the largest number in any year since the RAIU was The majority of these (10) were attributable to Iarnród established. The RAIU also commenced 2 investigations Éireann, and Iarnród Éireann have several initiatives in 2019, the first following a passenger getting a hand underway in this area. entrapped in a Luas Tram door at Heuston Station on the 26th of March 2019, and the second a near miss Two of Transdev’s safety performance indicators saw with an Iarnród Éireann signal maintenance worker at significant increases in 2019. These relate to the number Rush and Lusk Station on the 20th June 2019. 2 Table of Contents 1 Introduction ...............................................................................5 1.1 Introduction............................................................................5 1.2 Overview of Report.....................................................................5 1.3 The Commission for Railway Regulation ................................................5 1.4 Statistical Qualification .................................................................5 2 Railway Safety Trends in Ireland . 6 2.1 Introduction............................................................................6 2.2 Iarnród Éireann .........................................................................6 2.3 On Track Machine Contract ........................................................... 22 2.4 Transdev (Luas) Statistics ............................................................. 23 2.5 Board Na Móna Industrial Railway Statistics ........................................... 27 2.6 Heritage Railways..................................................................... 28 3 Public Representations . 29 3.1 Introduction.......................................................................... 29 3.2 2019 Data and Commentary.......................................................... 29 4 Railway Safety Trends in Europe . 31 4.1 Introduction.......................................................................... 31 4.2 Network Comparisons................................................................ 32 4.3 Fatalities relative to train-km .......................................................... 33 4.4 Precursor to accidents ................................................................ 33 4.5 Level-crossing accidents relative to train km .......................................... 34 4.6 Significant Accidents ................................................................. 34 4.7 Major Accidents Worldwide........................................................... 35 5 Accident Investigations . 36 5.1 Introduction.......................................................................... 36 5.2 RAIU Active Investigations ............................................................ 36 5.3 RAIU Investigation Reports 2019 ...................................................... 36 5.4 RAIU Safety Recommendations 2019 ................................................. 37 5.5 RAIU Recommendations Summary ................................................... 47 6 References . 48 6.1 Documents Used..................................................................... 48 3 Table of Figures Figure 1: IÉ Passenger Journeys 2010-2019 ............................................. 6 Figure 2: Passenger Train-km (top) Freight Train-km (bottom) on the IÉ-IM Network . 7 Figure 3: Personnel engaged in full time employment with IÉ (2010 – 2019) . 8 Figure 4: Passenger Injury Statistics by year ............................................ 10 Figure 5: Employee Injury statistics by year (Railway Operations) ....................... 11 Figure 6: Employee Injury statistics by year (Railway Infrastructure)..................... 12 Figure 7: Employee Injury statistics by year (Railway ECM).............................. 12 Figure 8: Total Collisions by year ....................................................... 13 Figure 9: Train Collision Statistics detail by year, part 2 ................................. 14 Figure 10: Number of level crossings by year............................................ 15 Figure 11: Level Crossing by type in Ireland . 16 Figure 12: Train Derailments by Year .................................................... 17 Figure 13: IÉ SPADs by year ............................................................. 18 Figure 14: Rolling Stock Incidents by year ............................................... 19 Figure 15: Broken Rails by year.........................................................