WASHINGTON — The conductor of a Union Pacific train was standing in a track adjacent to his train for an unknown reason when he was struck and killed by a Metra train, the National Transportation Safety Board said in its final investigation report on the Sept. 4, 2024, accident in Kenosha, Wis.
The incident occurred about 12:17 p.m. about a half-mile south of the Kenosha station on Metra’s UP North line. News reports identified the conductor who was killed as 34-year-old Austin Scott Raysby of Burlington, Wis. [see “Union Pacific worker struck …,” Trains.com, Sept. 4, 2024]. NTSB reports do not identify the individuals involved.
The conductor was conducting a wheel inspection following an alert from a trackside wheel temperature detector about 4 miles from where the train stopped, with the crew having chosen a location that would not block train platforms or grade crossings. The southbound Metra train was traveling 53.6 mph when it rounded a curve and the conductor came into view about 670 feet away; the operator in the Metra cab car sounded the horn and initiated an emergency brake application, but there was insufficient time for the Metra train to stop before striking the conductor.
Contributing to the accident, the report says, were the failure of the freight train’s crew to conduct a comprehensive job briefing that would have addressed risks during the wheel inspection, and the failure of the train’s engineer and a student engineer to maintain situational awareness that would have allowed them to radio the conductor to warn him of the approach Metra train.
The incident led Union Pacific to require track breach protection on its Kenosha Subdivision, which restricts trains from moving when an employee is working on the ground. Also the Federal Railroad Administration’s Switching Operations Fatalities Analysis Working Group issued an alert in June 2025 addressing the importance of comprehensive job briefings.
Also of interest to note the old C&NW practise of wrong way running.