JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – CSX Transportation, whose train accident and employee injury record has been deteriorating for five years, has hired a consulting firm to assess its safety programs and aims to hire a chief safety operating officer…
http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2018/05/25-csx-hires-consultant-to-improve-safety
Only goes to PROVE just how safety clueless the EHH cadre have been in wrecking the safety culture that was in place until EHH’s arrival.
Consult: a contraction of con (as in deceive) and insult (as in offend). That would make a consultant a __________.
Article says:
“CSX announced that DEKRA, an international safety consulting firm, will perform a comprehensive assessment to help the railroad improve safety for employees, customers, and communities in which it operates.”
Who the heck is DEKRA, and what do they know about modern US railroad practice?
They’ll do their studies, write their reports and recommendations, then the carrier will toss it all in a file cabinet never to see the light of day. Seen this played over a few times.
Yeah my husband has seen what those so called consulting company experts can do when brought into a couple carriers he drove for. One stated that the trucks were going to fast downhill and recommendations including removing engine brakes along with other ideas were needed to force the driver’s to go slower down the mountains that they ran through. Not one word about being 80k lbs on a 7 percent grade with bad brakes to begin with was said. The other carrier that hired one was told that his driver’s ran to hard and needed to be restricted on speed from 65 mph to 55 mph. They were thrown out of the office and according to my husband the owner of the company refused to pay them anything at all.
DEKRA is a European vehicle inspection company founded in Berlin, Germany in 1925 as Deutscher Kraftfahrzeug-Überwachungs-Verein.
I have seen their advertising in conjunction with Formula 1 racing over the years as sponors on various cars.
I suspect the cadre of former CSX officials that EHH terminated could reimplement the Safety Culture that was in place on CSX until EHH arrived with the orders ‘Safety be damned’.
You are right, DEKRA started as vehicle inspection company. They have since then spread into inspection and certification of all kinds of industrial issues: https://www.dekra-na.com/en/business
When I first read DEKRA in the Newswire I had the same thoughts. Why DEKRA and do they have railroading experience?
On the other hand perhaps it is necessary that someone from the outside looks at railroad safety from time to time.
Regards, Volker
CSX’s falling safety record began years before Harrison arrived. How did Harrison cause that?
“Steven Ditmeyer, a former FRA official, says the increased rates are significant.
It appears likely that CSX workers didn’t follow rules and procedures to ensure that the switch was properly lined before the Silver Star wreck, Ditmeyer says.
“I view it as a legacy of Hunter Harrison,” he says.”
He might not have started the decline but he for sure did nothing to stop it. Remember some of the rule changes? 3-point protection prohibited as well as nap breaks, brake sticks, while getting on an off moving equipment got allowed.
So EHH is not guilt-free.
Regards, Volker
Can someone provide data that shows the accident increases related to EHH changes in policies related to nap breaks, brake sticks, eliminating 3-point protection and allowing getting on and off moving equipment? Surely this statistical evidence must be available.
Gee, EHH was so powerful he caused the exemplary CSX safety record to deteriorate several years before he arrived? Oh, I suppose the CSX officials anticipated what would happen and they got a head start? And he will continue to wreck CSX from the grave?
Why Euclid, why on earth use statistics? Folks here believe they are all lies, same as accounting and research data.
With the elimination of the Harriman Safety Award after 2012, the carriers seem to be wanting to hide the issues from the public. Hard facts are hard to come by - unless you are in the Claims organization and know what is being paid out in injury settlements.
I am sure EHH will continue from the grave. He will cause people to leave switches unlocked just to make sure CSX remembers how bad he was.
Well the one indication of the truth would be whether CSX has immediately reversed EHH and put back the prohibition against getting on and off moving equipment, 3-point protection, use of brake sticks, and taking naps. Have they done that?
Isn’t really reported/recorded that way. https://safetydata.fra.dot.gov/OfficeofSafety/publicsite/query/reportalblecas.aspx
Well if those safety measures are not analyzed statistically, how does anybody know that they are worthwhile? When they decided that trainmen should not be getting on and off moving equipment, the proponents of the idea must cited some type on analysis proving that the change would be worthwhile. For an awful long time, people had concluded that getting on and off moving equipment was the right thing to do because it saved time.
That actually fits nicely with my contention that he wasn’t really running things in the first place. Mantle Ridge was (and is).
Ask those that changed the rules. I don’t know their motives. We were once forbidden,a nd now are allowed under certain circumstances. I don’t know why the change of heart. I don’t really care, either.
We have a piece of railroad that is 15mph. Used to be 30mph. Why the change? Becuase some superintnedent wanted it 15 because you have a signal (end of your paper limits) coming up in 2 miles. But yet other similar track arrangements don’t have speed restrictions imposed like that. It was just his idea and since he had the power - he implemented it. Stands to this date, despite numerous attempts by local management to revert it to 30. There aren’t always data or stats to support decisions. Sometimes it’s just what they feel like.