New Approach of Assessing Human Errors in Railways

Abstract

Inspired in particular by the works of Reason and Rasmussen and supported by application examples from the field of railway safety, the human error analysis approach proposed to improve the level of safety of rail transport systems involves three complementary levels. The first level of contextual analysis (before the accident) makes it possible to study the various factors favoring the production of the human error at the origin of the accident. The second cognitive level (during the accident) aims to identify the errors related to the human cognitive process involved in a given situation of insecurity. The third level of behavioral analysis (after the accident) focuses on evaluating the consequences of a wrong action in terms of damage to humans, the environment and the human-machine system. This article proposes an original methodological framework for the analysis, classification and evaluation of human errors involved in the safety of rail transport. The key factors taken into account in the analysis concern not only the inappropriate behavior of human operators involved in railway safety and risk management, but also the technical failures of the transport system and the operating and environmental conditions.