After brakeman Chris Cole lost both his legs on the job, railroad officials removed evidence before state regulators could see it, omitted key facts in reports and suspended him from a job he could never return to.
Time and again, Johnny Taylor’s duty to keep the rails safe from disaster conflicted with his employer’s desire to keep its trains running as fast and as frequently as possible, putting his career and family in peril.
Railroad companies have penalized workers for taking the time to make needed repairs and created a culture in which supervisors threaten and fire the very people hired to keep trains running safely. Regulators say they can’t stop this intimidation.
The nation’s largest freight rail carrier failed to fix and continued to use faulty equipment, according to the Federal Railroad Administration. Managers reportedly pressured inspectors to leave the yard so they could keep freight moving.