Additional technical solutions, prevention: in Gomel they discussed how to reduce railway injuries in the region

October 16, Gomel. In the Gomel region this year there has been an increase in non-occupational injuries at railway transport facilities. Prevention of emergency situations on the steel main in the region was discussed at a meeting of the Gomel Regional Executive Committee, BELTA correspondent reports.

As Olga Lashchenko, senior assistant prosecutor of the Gomel region for supervising the implementation of legislation in transport and customs authorities, said, the regional prosecutor’s office analyzed the implementation of legislation on the prevention of emergency situations on water, railway transport facilities and deaths on them. According to Olga Lashchenko, this year there has been an increase in non-occupational injuries at railway transport facilities in the Gomel region compared to last year. “Over the 8 months of this year, 12 cases occurred, of which 9 were fatal. For the entire 2022, there were only 7 cases, and 3 of them were fatal,” she announced the sad statistics.

The largest number of cases of injury in the region was recorded in the Rogachevsky (4), Zhlobinsky (3), Rechitsky (2) districts, one each in the Buda-Koshelevsky, Kalinkovichsky districts, and the Zheleznodorozhny district of Gomel.

The senior assistant prosecutor named the main reason for non-occupational injuries on the railway as deliberate disregard by citizens of basic safety measures. Thus, at the time of injury, 8 people were intoxicated.

Olga Lashchenko noted: this year in the region there are no cases of injuries to minors at railway facilities. However, facts have been recorded when children and teenagers were on railway tracks in violation of safety requirements. Only in September-October of this year, drivers used emergency braking 4 times due to the fact that there were foreign objects on the tracks, noted the senior assistant prosecutor.

“It is very worrying that children find entertainment on the railway tracks. This is unsafe and not harmless entertainment. And we intend to seriously investigate each case,” emphasized the prosecutor of the Gomel region, Viktor Morozov.

As noted at the meeting, this year the Gomel branch of the Belarusian Railway, together with regional departments of internal affairs, conducted more than 550 raids to maintain law and order at railway transport facilities. At train stations and stations, information about the rules for staying at railway infrastructure facilities is transmitted via loudspeaker communication. Information boards of dacha cooperatives, which are located near the railway tracks, post reminders about the rules of behavior on the railway.

Technical measures are also being taken to prevent injuries. For example, at a number of stations and stopping points, pedestrian decks were replaced and repaired. Over 70 safety information signs were installed. At pedestrian crossings, the signs “Take off your headphones”, “Take your child’s hand” and others were placed across the paths.

During raids, the most crime-prone transport facilities and traumatic sections of railway tracks are constantly monitored, boarding platforms and pedestrian crossings are monitored. Thus, over 9 months of this year, 490 administrative violations were identified and suppressed at railway facilities, which were associated with walking along the tracks in places not intended for this (for 2022 - 333), as well as 744 - with appearing in public places while intoxicated ( in 2022 - 521).

Chairman of the regional executive committee Ivan Krupko set the task of detailing a comprehensive plan of measures to prevent emergencies on water and railway transport facilities, especially in the technical part. “All directions must be clearly thought out. it is necessary to determine what else can be done to avoid injury to people, to see everything in time. And each fact of injury must be sorted out, analyzed, why it happened and how to prevent this in the future,” he emphasized.

“To get results, it is important that everyone gets involved in prevention, and there is no place for formalism in the work,” the governor concluded.