Worker Suspended For Saving Disabled Woman's Life

[Weaver]

People are talking like it takes 15 minutes to wheel someone off the train tracks.
He could probably have got her back up onto the platform before his call to stop the train would be over.

 

[Varrdy]

It's not unreasonable to assume sensationalist "journalism" at work but having been forced into becoming the nominated H&S "guy" at my old job, I had to go and do a course in which can be summed up with the following sentence...

Stupid people having "accidents" are making our public liability insurance premiums higher! By making up over-the-top "rules" we should be able to save a few quid!

I shit you not!

Sure there were some genuine nuggets on the course and there is the odd person blatantly on the make but I almost walked out of that course in disgust. In any case there was no way in hell I was going to go back to my place of work and spend an hour teaching them how to use a chair properly!

 

[crimson sickle2]

For the people that are wondering if this is just a tabloid thing, it might've been started by them, but other websites are running the story as well. Last I checked, the BBC wasn't considered a prime example of the tabloid menace, but I'm a yank, so what do I know?

I can understand forcing the guy through more training so he knows to stop the train in the future, but since everything worked out, he shouldn't be punished for saving a person's life and not slowing the British train schedule. Honestly, people want that system to move even slower? When there's little threat at all. Being ten minutes late was nothing back when I lived in London.

 

[Varrdy]

What if he jumped down onto the tracks an broke his ankle? Good job, now there's two pancakes on the lines instead.

Protocols are there for a reason. That said, it seems a bit harsh to suspend someone simply for doing what they thought was a heroic and selfless act.

Retrospect is always 20/20 - when you are thrust into a situation like this you just act. Call it instinct, call it a split-second decision or whatever, you don't think - you do something!

 

[Specter Von Baren]

People are talking like it takes 15 minutes to wheel someone off the train tracks.
He could probably have got her back up onto the platform before his call to stop the train would be over.

This is my thought too about this. I know everyone has good points about things like not getting other people hurt but the way everyone is talking about this is kind of skeeving me out.

But I guess if we're sharing things similar to this then I'll share this.

 

[Lionsfan]

Let me get this straight... Some guy hastily jumped down and tried to rescue the girl in the nick of time, when he could have simply called ahead, stopped the train and had ample time to get the woman back to the platform in the safest manner possible?

So, yeah. Suspension is a bit much, but reprimands are called for when someone doesn't do what they're trained and paid to do.

Do you know how long it takes for a train to stop? Three hundred tonnes has a lot of momentum behind it, you can't just say "stop the train".

The health and safety regulations are in place to allow business owners to not be held accountable for accidents. If this guy had died, no reparations to the company, since it was the employee at fault. It's a scummy practice where profit outweighs morality.

Except the train was over a quarter mile away and already slowing down.

People are talking like it takes 15 minutes to wheel someone off the train tracks.
He could probably have got her back up onto the platform before his call to stop the train would be over.

If that's true, why did he need 3 other people? It's not a movie, lifting people up isn't easy to do

What if he jumped down onto the tracks an broke his ankle? Good job, now there's two pancakes on the lines instead.

Protocols are there for a reason. That said, it seems a bit harsh to suspend someone simply for doing what they thought was a heroic and selfless act.

Retrospect is always 20/20 - when you are thrust into a situation like this you just act. Call it instinct, call it a split-second decision or whatever, you don't think - you do something!

You're right you just do something, you follow the right procedures. I know it's cool to hate on upper management, and "politically correct decisions", but the safety procedures are there for a reason. Because they're designed and put in place to keep as many people safe as possible

 

[Weaver]

People are talking like it takes 15 minutes to wheel someone off the train tracks.
He could probably have got her back up onto the platform before his call to stop the train would be over.

If that's true, why did he need 3 other people? It's not a movie, lifting people up isn't easy to do

Well, it's a good question! Did he need 3 others, or did they just selflessly jump down to help him?
I'm not sure!

 

[mitchell271]

He had enough time to call the operators to stop the train so there is some validity to the management's decision. That being said, the saving of someone's life should be cause to wave that suspension.

 

[DudeistBelieve]

We are as a nation increasingly fucked up, here's a lovely story from my local area:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2396222/Branded-paedophile-hiking-son-WILL-SELF-reveals-nightmare.html

TLDR: If you are male and near a child you are a paedophile.

This writer is a real fuck, he really can't grasp why the guard wouldn't let him cut through the school?

The school tells the guard, the policy. The guard enforces it. It's likely as simply as letting the guy cut through the school would of cost the guy his job.

If anything, homeboy did the right thing. He thought he saw something odd, he called the police and let them handle it as oppose to taking the matter into his own hands.

This writer is bitching over nothing.

 

[Ticklefist]

Nevermind. Removed argumentative post.

 

[shintakie10]

We are as a nation increasingly fucked up, here's a lovely story from my local area:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2396222/Branded-paedophile-hiking-son-WILL-SELF-reveals-nightmare.html

TLDR: If you are male and near a child you are a paedophile.

This writer is a real fuck, he really can't grasp why the guard wouldn't let him cut through the school?

The school tells the guard, the policy. The guard enforces it. It's likely as simply as letting the guy cut through the school would of cost the guy his job.

If anything, homeboy did the right thing. He thought he saw something odd, he called the police and let them handle it as oppose to taking the matter into his own hands.

This writer is bitching over nothing.

I was thinkin the same thing myself. Is it a little absurd? Maybe, but its not like anythin actually came of it. He was stopped for 30 minutes by a cop (you can get much worse for simply DWB in certain areas of the US), asked a few questions, and everyone went on their merry way. Instead of just lettin it slide, he threw a hissy fit because the guard wouldn't break protocol and put his job on the line for some random stranger.

 

[Lieju]

Well, after reading some of the posts here I still don't quite know what to say.

On the flipside it helps me to better understand why there's so many cases of people getting molested/beat up/whatever at public places full of people, and the bystanders just act like nothings happening.

Is it better to do what this guy did and neglect protocol, putting more people at risk?

No one is saying he shouldn't have helped, but he should have called the signaller to stop the trains to avoid the whole thing safely. As it was, he risked the lives of not just himself, but those three people who also helped the woman. (Did they get on the tracks?)

 

[Uncle Comrade]

We are as a nation increasingly fucked up, here's a lovely story from my local area:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2396222/Branded-paedophile-hiking-son-WILL-SELF-reveals-nightmare.html

TLDR: If you are male and near a child you are a paedophile.

This writer is a real fuck, he really can't grasp why the guard wouldn't let him cut through the school?

The school tells the guard, the policy. The guard enforces it. It's likely as simply as letting the guy cut through the school would of cost the guy his job.

If anything, homeboy did the right thing. He thought he saw something odd, he called the police and let them handle it as oppose to taking the matter into his own hands.

This writer is bitching over nothing.

And, if you read the article carefully, you'll notice that at no point do either the security guard or the police call him a paedophile or suggest that he was abducting the boy. He seems to have decided those motives for them, presumably because "Branded a paedophile for hiking with my son" makes a better article than "Told I couldn't hike on private property and was then checked on by police who left as soon as it became apparent that nothing illegal was going on."


Also, I loved this line;

The male officer got out and asked me to step into his vehicle and answer a few questions. Shocked, I told him I'd rather not. I said we were walking all the way from London to Whitby and that stepping into his car would rather ruin the purity of the experience.

"Sorry officer, I can't comply with your request. My recreational activity is far more important than your police
business."

OT: As many others have already said, jumping straight onto the tracks was dangerous, when there were procedures he could've followed. Obviously, nobody would say he was wrong to help the woman, and perhaps suspending him was harsh, but at the end of the day he did act incorrectly.

People seem to forget that H&S regulations are put in place for a reason, and it's not to stop people having fun or make it harder for them to help others, it's to ensure that in doing so they don't cause harm to themselves and those around them.

Unfortunately, sensationalist tabloids love to complain about the dreaded 'Health and Safety', and will bend the truth if necessary to get the outraged reaction they desire. (Such as using evocative language like "Suspended for saving woman's life", implying that isolated incidents are the norm for the whole country, and exaggerating things like the 'safety glasses to play conkers' story, which I'm pretty sure turned out to be a myth.)

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

You know, this 'risking the lives of others' needs to be addressed.

Did he call those others down? Do we absolutely know he didn't say "Get the fuck out, you're not allowed to be down here?". Putting others at risk essentially boils down to if he called others to help him. If he did, he most deservedly earned that violation. If he didn't, when a train is coming and a woman is stuck on the rails is not the time to sit there and try to enforce policy.

Again, by the article, I don't know who went down first. Did he stick his head out and see people going down on the tracks, realized what happened, and had to make a quick decision to get everyone off of the tracks as soon as possible before calling it in? Because if so, he didn't risk people's lives. He got them out sooner.

Did he get on the track first? If so, did he ask for help? If not, did he try to keep people from coming down? If anyone can answer these questions without a bit of contention, then I'll know if he 'risked others lives due to his action'. Until that time, I find a lot of these arguments suspect.