Page 7 - Report of the railway accidents investigated in 2023

Annual report 2023 This has been specified by Section 49 of the Railways Act “Cases affecting railway
safety”. The same Section also specifies submission of a written notification of an accident and a serious accident with clarified and verified facts within three working days. The written notice contains specified and verified facts about the occurrence. Additional information about an accident or serious accident is also provided verbally immediately, and in writing within three working days of receiving the information. A report regarding incidents is submitted within three working days if the ESIB requests it. The obligation of the railway undertaking to take all necessary measures to find out the causes of an occurrence affecting railway safety is stipulated. Subsection 7 of the same Section provides the delegating authority for the establishment of a ministerial regulation on reporting incidents affecting railway safety. Pursuant to the delegating authority the latest version of the Minister of Economic Affairs and Infrastructure Directive No. 83 “Safety Management System, Safety Indicators, Verification of Compliance with Railway Infrastructure, Traffic Management and Safety Requirements, their Reporting, Forms and Deadlines and Notification of Incidents Affecting Railway Safety” entered into force on 14 August 2023. Annex 11 of the Directive provides the format for written notification of a serious accident or an accident. Annex 12 of the Directive provides the format for reporting an incident.
The obligation of the Safety Investigation Bureau to immediately initiate a safety investigation in the case of a serious accident is provided by Section 50 of the Railways Act “Initiation of a safety Investigation”. To initiate a safety investigation in other cases, the conditions for making a discretionary decision have been legalised. The discretionary decision must consider the seriousness of the accident or incident, whether it is one of a series of accidents or incidents affecting the system as a whole, and its impact on rail safety. The ESIB may initiate a safety investigation in the event of an accident or incident which, under certain conditions, could have caused a serious accident, as well as in the event of a technical failure of a subsystem of the pan-European railway system or a component of the interconnection. When initiating a safety investigation, the ESIB takes into account the requests submitted by the safety authority of another member state, the Consumer Protection and Technical Regulatory Authority as well as the railway infrastructure undertaking and the railway transport undertaking. The same section stipulates that a decision to initiate a safety investigation is to be made within 2 months of receiving the notification of an accident or incident. The ESIB notifies the European Union Agency for Railways within one week of initiating the safety investigation. The principal legal aim of the safety investigation is to determine whether the occurrence affecting railway safety was caused by an action, inaction, an event, a circumstance, or a combination thereof and propose recommendations to prevent such occurrence in the future and to improve railway safety.
The obligation for railway infrastructure managers and third persons to provide any relevant information they hold, when requested by the ESIB, has been established by Section 51 “Proceedings of a Safety Investigation”. It is stipulated by legislation that
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