Railway Accidents Due to Human Error: A Historic Analysis of the UK Railways (1945-2012)

Accident investigation and analysis is key to reinforcing and improving railway safety. Over the years, a large number of railway accidents have occurred due to degraded human performance and human error and essentially the tasks of train drivers and signallers have remained the same. Although it can be claimed that new technologies and equipment have assisted in gradually reducing railway operating accidents, no investigation has been conducted to investigate whether railway performance shaping factors (R-PSFs), attributed to degraded human performance, have changed or remained constant. Focusing on the U.K. railways, this paper analyses railway accidents involving human error in the period between 1945 and 2012. The purpose of the paper is two fold. First, to identify whether the number and type of the factors that affect human performance and contribute to human errors have changed during this period. Second, to assess the quality of data collected via investigation reports and to determine whether the collection of such data has evolved and improved.The analysis focuses on identifying the number of the R-PSFs and their relation different variables, such as the responsible personnel, the immediate causes, the time and the location of the event. In turn, the contribution those variables into the severity of an accident is calculated. Moreover, any changes in the trends and patterns of the number of R-PSFs over the time is explored, using smoothing techniques of Time Series Analysis. Finally the quality of the collected data is analysed using the Data Quality Index.Results show that the data investigation process and collecting data has significantly improved. In contrast, although accident rates have decreased, the average number and type of the factors that affect human performance remain the same.