A fine of £1 million (with extra costs of £52,267) has been administered to Govia Thameslink Railway Ltd (GTR) after being convicted for the offence under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.
24-year-old Simon Brown died on 7 August 2016 when a trackside gantry struck his head on the Brighton to London Victoria train which was going close to 60 mph at the time. His head had passed through a window (for reasons unknown) in the door of the 442 train and had struck the gantry within 230mm of the window. The window in question was in a carriage door opposite to the Guard's compartment and was fully accessible; a metal bar ran along the top of the window pane, and included the opening instructions, allowing it to be opened by passengers to around 2/3rd of the way so that they can open the door below in an emergency situation.
The sentence was passed by His Honour Judge Jeffrey Pegden following GTR entering a guilty plea at court on 8 May 2019. Following the tragedy, GTR made immediate steps to place the bar across the pane, so that it was possible still for passengers to open the door if necessary, but not to be able to place their heads out of the carriage. The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) noted that there had been a similar incident in 2002, which had also resulted in enforcement action.
The ORR believed that the risks associated with droplight windows should have been identified by a suitable risk assessment, and introduced adequate control measures, however, in this example, GTR failed to take the appropriate action, which resulted in such a terrible accident.
