Historical numbers of railway workers employed and of worker fatalities/casualties?

[eldomtom2]

There has been quite a bit written on railway worker safety, but so far as I'm aware very little on the actual rate of accidents per workers employed, and even less on historical trends of accidents. Both figures were recorded (in quite some detail, including division by worker grades), so my question is whether there are publicly available sources on total worker numbers and of the number of casualties/fatalities? All I can find is this, which though primarily interested in UK safety figures as compared to those of the US (British railways and mines being much safer than those in the US, apparently) does give data on fatalities per thousand for 1889-1901. Hopefully there is some publicly available source (and not an expensive, out-of-print book) that gives the figures for earlier and later years.

[keefer]

Came across this site: http://www.railwayaccidents.port.ac.uk/

Seems to be a work-in-progress, don't know if it has what you're looking for.

 

On the railwaysarchive site there is a PDF download of a book "Railway Accidents - Legislation and Statistics 1825 to 1924" by H. Raynar Wilson (published 1925). Tables show accidents by year/company/cause etc. and on p.47 & 48 (of the PDF) there are a couple of tables of passenger/servant accident stats.

Haven't had time to read more but looks like an interesting book anyway, covering the first 100 years of the railways.

https://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/Wilson_Accidents1925.pdf

Edited April 1, 2020 by keefer

[The Johnster]

No idea.  I am aware that there was a rise in the rate of trackside deaths that coincided with the replacement of steam traction, as trackside workers had become used to being aware of white steam clouds in their peripheral vision, and the effect of hammer blow.  Despite the loss of traffic in the early 60s, the rate of fatalities rose, prompting the introduction of small yellow warning panels on diesel and electric traction, and later full end yellow panels when the small ones proved ineffective (especially when they were dirty).  Even this did not reverse the trend, and it was the introduction of hi-viz and drivers' response to it that eventually turned the tide, and the later use of high power headlights has further reduced the casualty rate.

 

Modern working methods have drastically reduced the amount of shunting, which was a very dangerous activity indeed.  Apart from crush injuries between buffers, loose shunting of wagons in yards was something that required shunters to be agile and constantly alert, and often needed them to control vehicles by hanging on to a brake stick while the vehicle was moving.  

 

Mechanisation of many jobs has reduced the number of men on or about the tracks as well, so you need to be looking at casualty rates as well as the actual totals.  Early railways were a lot more dangerous of course, until experience developed rules and working methods.  Many of those working trackside had come from the navvy community, not known for safe working practices!  When I passed out as a guard in 1970, the inspector somewhat melodramatically commented that 'every one of these rules was found at the bottom of a bucket of blood', which I've never forgotten and which is not entirely untrue.

Edited April 1, 2020 by The Johnster

[iands]

Like 'The Johnster', I don't know of any particular reports or sources, have you tried looking at the ORR website? Yes, it will be "modern" data but might also reference older data.

 

When I did my "induction training" at York in 1974  (curiously a few months after I had started work and been walking about the railway for about 4 months), I remember the instructor telling us that (based on available data at that time) most fatal accidents occurred to staff within the first 9 years of service, so statistically, if you got 10 years service in, the likelihood was that you would be okay for the rest of your career! Strange then that, at the time, staff only qualified for sick pay after 10 years service or, as I was in the S&T, you reached the grade of Senior Technician, whichever came first - I often wondered if these two were directly connected in some way? Needless to say, I reached the grade of Senior Technician just a few weeks before I got 10 years service in (and luckily managed to avoid any serious injury during my 46 year career), so I guess there may be some merit in statistics. 

[eldomtom2]

3 hours ago, keefer said:

Came across this site: http://www.railwayaccidents.port.ac.uk/

Seems to be a work-in-progress, don't know if it has what you're looking for.

The RWLD Project seems to trying to be a combination of memorial and family history resource. Analysis of the data in a wider context is pretty much nonexistent (and has been for about five years now), though admittedly anything of that nature would be difficult due to the fact that the subsets involved were chosen through unknown means.

 

1 hour ago, iands said:

Like 'The Johnster', I don't know of any particular reports or sources, have you tried looking at the ORR website? Yes, it will be "modern" data but might also reference older data.

The Board of Trade at least certainly published yearly figures on railway accidents, but these are not publicly available outside of physical archives. Certainly in order to make claims about the effects of yellow ends and hi-viz clothing someone had to have been keeping track of the figures. I don't believe the ORR has anything on the subject. The RAIB sometimes references previous accidents where relevant in their reports, but I'm looking for something more high-level and looking at the numbers rather than the specific details of individual accidents.

[Wheatley]

For fatalities there will be numbers somewhere but not necessarily on line. Certainly I've seen a table of track worker deaths published (on paper) from the 1940s to date, the numbers at the older end of the table were in the hundreds per year.  Until RIDDOR came along in 1995 a lot of injury categories were bulk reported, i.e. totals only with no detail so the non-fatals are incredibly difficult to track down.

 

Decisions were not always necessarily statistically or cost/benefit based, BR was a command and control structure and sometimes things happened because someone with a sufficiently large hat said so (and nobody with a larger hat disagreed). Headlights on the Central Wales were, I believe, a local management response to a local problem as were (I think) headlights on Highland section Type 2s.

 

[slilley]

Couple of things. 

 

1. Whitakers Almanack has some statistics for railway fatalities. I have plenty of them from the late 1950s through to the present day.

 

2. The Head of Personnel presented a report to the BR Board each month on fatalities and discretionary grants to the deceased's family. These are held at the National Archives at Kew.

 

Best wishes

 

Simon

[eldomtom2]

Well yes, I'm not denying that the sources exist. What I'm looking for is something that doesn't require going to the National Archives.

[slilley]

12 minutes ago, eldomtom2 said:

Well yes, I'm not denying that the sources exist. What I'm looking for is something that doesn't require going to the National Archives.

I guess Whitakers Alamanack is your best bet then.

[Trog]

5 hours ago, The Johnster said:

When I passed out as a guard in 1970, the inspector somewhat melodramatically commented that 'every one of these rules was found at the bottom of a bucket of blood', which I've never forgotten and which is not entirely untrue.

 

Which must have made them very difficult to read as I was told that they were printed with blood.

[eldomtom2]

1 hour ago, slilley said:

I guess Whitakers Alamanack is your best bet then.

What precise figures do they have in them though? They may only give figures for certain types of accident.

[The Johnster]

8 hours ago, eldomtom2 said:

Certainly in order to make claims about the effects of yellow ends and hi-viz clothing someone had to have been keeping track of the figures.

The claims are based on articles I read at the time in 'Rail News', which often had features about safety.  in fact it was a very good little in house monthly, and I continued to take it for some time after I left the railway; you could buy it at the ticket office at Cardiff Queen Street, though AFAIK not anywhere else.  Sixpence IIRC.

[The Stationmaster]

18 hours ago, Wheatley said:

For fatalities there will be numbers somewhere but not necessarily on line. Certainly I've seen a table of track worker deaths published (on paper) from the 1940s to date, the numbers at the older end of the table were in the hundreds per year.  Until RIDDOR came along in 1995 a lot of injury categories were bulk reported, i.e. totals only with no detail so the non-fatals are incredibly difficult to track down.

 

Decisions were not always necessarily statistically or cost/benefit based, BR was a command and control structure and sometimes things happened because someone with a sufficiently large hat said so (and nobody with a larger hat disagreed). Headlights on the Central Wales were, I believe, a local management response to a local problem as were (I think) headlights on Highland section Type 2s.

 

Headlights on the Central wales Line were not a local response to anything.  They became a requirement put in place by HMRI when a number of level crossings on the route were newly reduced to open crossing status and the route effectively became a light railway.  They were already required on the line between Pantyffynon and Gwaun Cae Gurwen because of Cawdor open crossing.

[Wheatley]

2 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Headlights on the Central wales Line were not a local response to anything.  They became a requirement put in place by HMRI when a number of level crossings on the route were newly reduced to open crossing status and the route effectively became a light railway.  They were already required on the line between Pantyffynon and Gwaun Cae Gurwen because of Cawdor open crossing.

I stand corrected, thanks Mike. Never believe everything drivers tell you...

[slilley]

21 hours ago, eldomtom2 said:

What precise figures do they have in them though? They may only give figures for certain types of accident.

I have just fished out the Whitakers for 1973.

 

It give details of railwaymen killed in accidents ( BR LT, and other railways) in 1971 as 7. The 1967-71 total it gives as 32.

 

The number of people employed as at 31 Dec 1971 was 201,674, compared with 207,707 on 31 Dec 1970.

 

Best wishes

 

Simon

Edited April 2, 2020 by slilley

[eldomtom2]

I suspect that number is of those killed in specifically train accidents. 7 deaths seems very low considering that Terence Gourvish in his post-1974 history of BR lists an average of 101.2 deaths per year for the 1974-79 period (he lists an average of 292 per year for the 1950s, but considering the job losses of the 1960s how much safety actually improved is unclear without full figures on numbers employed).

Edited April 2, 2020 by eldomtom2

[SED Freightman]

Here are a couple of extracts from The Railway Yearbook of 1926 which quote accident totals for each grade in 1924 and the number of staff employed by grade in March 1925.  While I would have expected the dangers of freight related and permanent way work to show up in high casualty figures for the relevant grades, the figures for Engine-Drivers and Motormen appear (to me) surprisingly high.

 

 

 

 

[eldomtom2]

That's the sort of figures I was looking for. The question is where can the figures for other years be found - second-hand Railway Yearbooks seem to command high prices.

[Joseph_Pestell]

5 minutes ago, eldomtom2 said:

That's the sort of figures I was looking for. The question is where can the figures for other years be found - second-hand Railway Yearbooks seem to command high prices.

 

The library of what used to be the Chartered Institute of Transport would be able to help you with this research in normal times.

[The Stationmaster]

22 hours ago, SED Freightman said:

Here are a couple of extracts from The Railway Yearbook of 1926 which quote accident totals for each grade in 1924 and the number of staff employed by grade in March 1925.  While I would have expected the dangers of freight related and permanent way work to show up in high casualty figures for the relevant grades, the figures for Engine-Drivers and Motormen appear (to me) surprisingly high.

 

 

 

 

Very interesting and all the high risk jobs seem to be reflected much as expected.  The figure for Drivers doesn't really surprise me as there were numerous ways accidents could occur on shed, particularly with inside motion engines where it was not unknown for drivers to be killed or injured if the engine they were oiling inside was hit or moved while they were 'in between'.  Similarly with 'Labourers' who were basically loco shed staff and could be involved with moving engines and working on engines in steam.

 

One figure which surprises me is the very low injury rate for Signalmen in a grade where ruptures were an ever present hazard.  But I presume injury developing over time is not reflected in the figure which no doubt comes from staff accident reports so doesn't  necessarily include people going sick or placed on light duties because of a long term condition.  Does the book say anything about light duty staff or  - if they existed by then - what were later known as 'Green Card men' who had a green National Insurance Card to reflect thei fact that they had some sort of physical impairment?

[Nearholmer]

There has been a previous thread on this topic, but to repeat two possible sources:

 

- the York/Portsmouth project that is really trying to get to the bottom of it; and,

 

- trades unions, where I think the central office archives will have old campaign material that touches upon the subject.

 

There was more in the previous thread, but what is was called, I have no idea. Sorry.

[slilley]

On 02/04/2020 at 18:38, eldomtom2 said:

I suspect that number is of those killed in specifically train accidents. 7 deaths seems very low considering that Terence Gourvish in his post-1974 history of BR lists an average of 101.2 deaths per year for the 1974-79 period (he lists an average of 292 per year for the 1950s, but considering the job losses of the 1960s how much safety actually improved is unclear without full figures on numbers employed).

I think you are probably right. If you want numbers employed each year, then I can certainly let you have that. I have most Whitakers Alamancks from the late 50s through to the present day.

[eldomtom2]

5 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

- the York/Portsmouth project that is really trying to get to the bottom of it

Not from a statistical viewpoint though. It is seemingly not interested in an analysis of how safety changed over time, despite definitely having access to the records that would provide the necessary information. It is unfortunately useless from this specific viewpoint; at the moment its searchable databases are most useful for family historians.

[The Stationmaster]

How do you determine 'how safety changed' beyond the statistical information?  For example injuries to and fatalities of Shunters need to be first divided between Goods and Passenger Shunters and carry that forward beyond the time when the separate desgnations ceased.  And while the rate of fatalities/serious injuries would be partially  visible from the statistical information the drivers of change to those rates would not be because they come from various other sources such as changes to equipment and working practices.  Plus of course you wiuld presumably need to adjust as far as injuries are concerned due to changes in reportable accidents over the years?

[eldomtom2]

That is a rather "perfect is the enemy of good" argument to me. Of course a totally accurate and detailed survey is impossible - too much data was lost or never recorded to make one without making assumptions somewhere. But examining it on the broadest level possible by comparing yearly fatality rates does not seem especially hard or completely unable to produce useful data - which does not seem to be something that Mike Esbester is interested; his focus seems mainly to examine safety literature through the lens of Foucauldian views on power dynamics.