Abstract
Human errors occurring during railway maintenance activities can significantly reduce the availability of equipment. Identification of potential human errors, their causes and prediction of the associated probabilities are important stages in order to manage such errors. This paper investigates the probability of human error during the maintenance of railway bogies. A case study examines technicians performing maintenance on the disc brake assembly unit, wheel set, and bogie frame under various error producing conditions in a railway maintenance workshop in Luleå, Sweden. The Human Error Assessment and Reduction Technique (HEART) is employed to determine the probability of human error occurring during each of the maintenance tasks, while fault tree analysis is used to define the potential errors throughout the maintenance process. The probability of a technician committing an error during the maintenance of the disc brake assembly, wheel set, and bogie frame is found to be 0.20, 0.039 and 0.021 respectively, with the human error probability (HEP) for the entire bogie 0.24. Time pressure, ability to detect and perceive problems, over-riding information, the need to make decisions and mismatches between the operator and designer’s model turn out to be major contributors to human error. These findings can help maintenance management personnel to better understand the error producing conditions that may lead to errors and in turn serve as an input to modify policies and guidelines for railway maintenance tasks.
Highlights
Dhillon (2007) highlights the key role of the railway system in a nation’s economy
Human Error Assessment and Reduction Technique (HEART) suggests that every time a task is performed, there is a likelihood of failure and the associated probability of this failure is affected by one or more error producing conditions (EPCs), for instance the shortage of time or inexperience
Whilst accidents can arise from human error in railway maintenance activities, there is little in the research to help identify these factors and to subsequently assess the probability of human error
Summary
Dhillon (2007) highlights the key role of the railway system in a nation’s economy. It is an imperative for all stakeholders with a railway network worldwide to aim for a safe, highly reliable, and excellent quality railway system (Wilson et al, 2007). The personnel performing maintenance tasks are confronted with a set of error producing conditions (EPCs) within rigorous railway maintenance systems, which can degrade their performance Such EPCs include: time pressure, negligible feedback, confined work spaces, awkward body positions (e.g. bent and/or twisted backs, both arms above the shoulder), poorly written procedures and the lack of access to the required equipment. In the UK, Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB, 2012) has introduced the Railway Action Reliability Assessment, to estimate Human Error Probabilities for railway operations, based upon HEART This technique has not been applied to railway maintenance it is beyond the scope of this technique to provide a detailed list of factors that affect the performance of operators, e.g. it ignores the safety culture or the safety management of an organisation The following sections provide a relevant summary of the two previous studies for the purposes of this paper
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