Rail Incident Investigator Training

The rail industry currently varies widely in the degree to which individual organisations train and develop rail incident investigators. Some organisations have made significant steps towards adapting a range of training programs from overseas institutions and/or Australian safety agencies – supplementing formal training with short courses of professional development. Other organisations have taken a less formal approach and relied on impromptu training courses and local expertise on a needs basis. The findings of a scoping study into the potential of developing a national training program and capability framework (P4.107) has identified that the industry stands to gain a great deal from taking a more collaborative approach to the development of rail incident investigators. The strong level of support for a unified approach to training corresponds with the appointment of a national rail safety regulator in 2012. As the rail industry continues on its journey to harmonise its operations across the sector, collaboration in relation to the training of rail incident investigators will grow in importance. This project has the following aims:

1. Clarify the position of ATSB as the single national investigator for all significant accidents and establish the potential for collaboration to achieve an industry recognised investigator training framework,

2. Establish the potential market demand from a broad range of stakeholders involved in rail investigations and align demand with delivery options,

3. Develop a comprehensive training needs analysis for rail incident investigators, including mapping rail incident investigation capability more extensively within and outside of the industry,

4. In collaboration with safety agencies and rail organisations, develop a rail-specific capability framework to define curricula for a multi-level national training program for use by the industry,

5. In collaboration with education and training providers, negotiate an appropriate and consistent training delivery and assessment mechanism and national standard for rail incident investigators.

The outcome of achieving these aims will provide the industry with a nationally recognised career pathway for rail investigators and the ability to share resources from a pool of qualified professionals.