When young boys dream of becoming train drivers, they never imagine that part of their training will involve advice on coping with suicides on the track.
It is estimated that one in three train drivers working from Dublin's Connolly Station has experienced a fatal accident. The majority of these incidents are suicides. On hearing of a suicide on the railway, people's sympathies immediately go to the victim and his or her family, but a suicide can have a lasting effect on the train driver. Many drivers experience nightmares and flashbacks and need regular counselling to come to terms with being unwittingly used as the instrument to cause someone's death.
"It's unbelievable trauma for drivers," says Tony Tobin, secretary of the SIPTU branch representing railway workers. He knows of drivers who have experienced up to four suicides. "One driver used to say that if a black bag blew in front of the train, he would think it was a person."
Most drivers eventually return to work, but others cannot bring themselves to drive a train again. Some drivers who do return retire early, sometimes because their health has deteriorated since the incident.
Iarnrod Eireann has noted an increase in track suicides in recent years. "There were one, two or three fatalities a year in the early 1990s. By 1993/1994, that had started to go to the half dozen. Now it's nine or 10 a year. Most of these are suicides," says John Keenan, Iarnrod Eireann's human resources manager. The company's handling of suicides was patchy in the past but Iarnrod Eireann is now trying to adopt a more consistent approach. Tobin welcomes this new approach and says that such back-up is essential for drivers.
Iarnrod Eireann's driver training programme now carries a section on coping with a fatal accident. This includes a talk from a driver who has experienced a fatality. When a suicide occurs on a track, Iarnrod Eireann now ensures that the driver is accompanied home afterwards, generally by the district manager. The driver is then urged to have counselling within 48 hours. Drivers are encouraged to take time off and they are paid their average earnings during that time.
Iarnrod Eireann is now setting up a "buddy" scheme which involves assigning a driver who has experienced a suicide to a driver who has just had the experience. The company also encourages drivers to come into the depot when they are off, to maintain the routine of work. "It's extremely traumatic for drivers, but overall they cope very well," says Keenan. Drivers are extremely reluctant to talk about their experience of suicides, partly because of the distressing memory and partly out of concern for the victim's family.
"Paul" has already experienced two suicides and one fatal accident. But he doesn't see himself as especially unlucky. "The number of suicides seems to be growing. It's a horrible experience but it's like part of the job now," he says.
His first suicide happened when a man jumped onto the line and stood facing the train which was approaching the station. "I was going at 20 to 25 miles an hour but there was no way I could stop in time." The second suicide was equally traumatic. "It's a dreadful sight to see the body on the line," he says. Because of the violent nature of the death, it is also very difficult for the medical services charged with removing the body. Inquests can be particularly traumatic for the driver, as they see the victim's family and have to relive the experience. Do drivers often think of the victim and wonder what sort of a person he or she was? "I don't know about others, but in my case I would often wonder what drove a person to do a thing like that," Paul says.
"There's such a feeling of powerlessness," says another driver. "You can see it happening in front of you, but you cannot do anything to prevent it." This driver was involved in a girl's fatal accident - this was not a suicide. He recalls that he was two minutes late that day and tormented himself with the idea that if he had been on time, the accident would not have happened.
"It affects you in ways you would never expect," he says. When he got off the train and saw the girl's school bag hanging on the engine, he was violently ill. "It affected me badly for a long time." Even now, he cannot touch his children's schoolbags.
Iarnrod Eireann was very good to him, he says. The district manager drove to collect him after the accident and he was immediately put in touch with a counsellor. He was having regular nightmares about the event, so Iarnrod Eireann's chief medical officer suggested that he see a psychiatrist. He was put on medication and then consulted a psychoanalyst. She made him tape his recollection of the event and play it every day. While it was horrific to listen to himself describing the events, the therapy worked and he now feels able to talk about the accident.
He returned to work about seven months after the accident. After two months, he travelled on the line where the incident happened. "I still pass it and it's a constant reminder of what happened," he says.
"It's become so common now, particularly on parts of the DART," he says. Paul says he still thinks of the suicides when he passes the scene. "But for your family and yourself, you have to keep going."