On 15 and 16 June, representatives from national authorities and railway operators of Egypt, Israel, Morocco, and Tunisia took part in international workshops organised in the scope of the EUMedRail project. The aim was to discuss the setting-up of a permanent and independent investigation body as well as how to improve national procedures taking into account of EU experiences.  

The workshops gave an opportunity to address topics such as accident investigation starting from the notification of such event, via occurrence reconstruction, analysis of safety management systems and identification of root causes and contributory factors, till the issuing of safety recommendations and elaboration of investigation reports. ERA underlined the benefits of a harmonised framework and approach to accident and incident reporting, with a view to share lessons learnt and address similar safety risks in the future.  

National investigation bodies from Belgium, Finland and the Netherlands illustrated, with a series of study cases, how state of the art investigations are carried out and informed how collection and processing of evidence during on-site examinations are carried out, informed about the analysis of safety management systems performance and the incidence of human and organisational factors, besides the issuing and follow-up of safety recommendations.    

Participants also reflected on the cooperation between national safety authorities and investigation bodies at EU level, and examined the possibility to set up a regional network to continue the exchange of information, to share good practice in data collection, and closely monitor safety developments.

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