When the rail freight company Pacific National Pty Ltd was moving a train of four locomotives to the company's provisioning centre at Footscray on 19 August 2002, one of the drivers began climbing the steps of the second locomotive. His head struck a girder of a railway bridge and he fell between the train and the bridge, receiving fatal injuries.
The employer was prosecuted for breach of s 21(2)(a) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 1985 (Vic) and pleaded guilty. It had failed to provide and maintain safe plant and systems of work.
The Melbourne Magistrate's Court was told that, while the train driver had not obeyed a company safety alert prohibiting the boarding of a moving locomotive, the lack of a clear communications procedure between the drivers had been the real problem.
After the accident, the company had issued an alert instructing drivers to be in communication with each other when trains were being moved. Train marshalling procedures were improved, as was visibility at the railway bridge. The magistrate noted that these safety improvements had been both practical and relatively inexpensive.
A media release from the Victorian WorkCover Authority on 8 February reported that the court had recorded a conviction and fined the company $50,000.
