I happen to agree with the train company....I am sure there would be the opposite rhetoric on here if someone had been praised for not wearing their fall protection!...I am sure the investigation will highlight the fact that the person did the right thing within his experience, qualification and training...but they just can't say I'll ignore that.. As for drowning incidents...having been to a few most bodies have been in the water for hours and it is then more body recovery than rescue..the risk management principle used is we would commit resources to rescue saveable lives...no point risking the lives of 6 firemen or specialist paramedics (HART) when the person is already deceased..there is a lot of pressure put on the emergency services through peoples uninformed perception of events which hinders the safety message we are all trying to promote..if it was my loved one.,..even knowing what I know I would jump in..(As they say round these parts 'nowt as queer as folk eh!')

I too agree with the train company. I note, despite the rhetoric in the press, that he hasn't been sacked, he's been suspended while an investigation is conducted. If he was a banker suspended during an investigation the press would be in uproar that he wasn't sacked and outrage that he'd been put on cushy gardening leave. And with respect to the OP, I've seen stories in the press of all sorts of rubbish that never happened, and I don't know of any case of someone face down in water known to be knee-deep until the specialist team arrived. Basing your choice of action on stories that never happened is not the act of a rational person, in my view.

By all means suspend the individual for "allegedly" breaching policies and procedures. However, treat him the same as a member of other professions, Members of Parliament, medical profession senior managers and others who finds themselves suspended. On full pay until found guilty. In this case, somehow, I doubt it. Rodger Ker

jfw - a very overly emotional response on the basis of very limited information from a newspaper article. Hardly established facts are there. Do you work for the Daily Mail by any chance???

Interesting story - that is exactly what it is at this stage. Truth will probably be less interesting and again probably not even make the news, with a strong likelihood that unless you live in the locality of the original incident or involved with the industry and/or people, not get to know the truth. Which may subsequently lead to another myth being created for the H&S bods to dispel.

I can understand why he did what he did, but as a railway worker he know the correct procedure for stopping trains before entering the tracks. By doing what he did he placed other members of the public, who were assisting the person, in danger also. His responsibility should have been to ensure the tracks were kept clear. If he did not do this nobody else would. In a similar fashion there was an incident over here a couple of years ago where a worker was overcome with fumes in a silo. His co-worker did not follow procedure and vent the silo externally and instead rushed to his assistance and died alongside the worker. With regards the OP mentioning of river rescue there was a case recently whereby the ambulance services would not treat a person on a boat which was docked until fire and rescue arrived and removed the ill person to dry land. They were offered new lifejackets by a local supplier. It took the fire service 25 minutes to arrive as they were a retained service. Sometimes procedures are implemented for the correct reasons but there can be justification for not strictly following them from time to time. I hope this post comes accross as a balanced view and not contradictory. Kevin

As gramsay rightly pointed out at #9, suspension is a neutral action used by various organisations to enable circumstances to be investigated. However, too many people, including suspendees, their friends, relatives and colleagues - and evidently journalists keen to publish a story - misperceive a suspension to imply that a suspended person is guilty and that the related investigation has a foregone conclusion. During the 1990s I heard that a manager of a centre for young people had been suspended while an investigation was carried out into alleged financial irregularities. The manager was promptly reinstated after investigation found that the allegations were unfounded and had probably been made by a disgruntled former employee. However, as bad news usually seems to travel faster and stick longer than good news, I wonder if the manager was left with some taint in the minds of some people. While on the subject of misunderstood words, I guess that quite a proportion of people think that being prosecuted is the same as being convicted. In fact it just means being accused of a crime and then tried in court where the outcome for any charge can be a verdict of 'guilty' (conviction) or 'not guilty' (acquittal). I'd better add that in Scotland there can be a third verdict of 'not proven' where a judge or jury has insufficient evidence to convict but is not sufficiently convinced of the accused person's innocence to give a 'not guilty' verdict.

This matter is subject to British Transport Police Investigations, so is best not commented on in these Forums at this stage