WIT Press


Using Fault Tree Analysis To Identify The Failures Of Level Crossing Protection Devices

Price

Free (open access)

Volume

155

Pages

12

Page Range

1197 - 1208

Published

2012

Size

548 kb

Paper DOI

10.2495/SC121002

Copyright

WIT Press

Author(s)

J. C. Jong, T. H. Lin, C. S. Suen, C. K. Lee, I. C. Chen, H. J. Wu

Abstract

Level crossings are potential hazardous locations in a railway system. To reduce the risk of level crossings, several active protection devices such as flashing lights and barriers may be installed. Previous studies have proved that such protection devices are effective in decreasing the probability of accidents. However, these protection devices may be partially out of order or receive error signals. Once protection devices cannot operate correctly, they may deliver wrong information that confuses the users. As a result, the users may trespass a level crossing in a dangerous situation. To realize the causes of different types of wrong operations, this study categorized them into error warning, conflict warning, and no warning. Then fault tree analysis is employed to identify the failure types and the causes behind the wrong operations of protection devices, including the failures of flashing lights, boom barriers, train direction indicators, obstacle detectors, and emergency buttons. The results indicate that error warning is mostly due to the error messages of the track circuit. Conflict warning is caused by specific failures of the protection devices. Finally, the wiring error of the track circuit is the main cause leading to no warning. 

Keywords

level crossing, protection device, fault tree analysis.