The LE for VIA 92 had more than 33 years of railway experience, including 28 years as a locomotive engineer. The LE had initially worked as a locomotive engineer for Canadian National (CN) for 24 years before moving to VIA where he had worked for the past 4 years. The ICLE had 34 years of railway experience, including 25 years as a locomotive engineer. The ICLE had initially worked as a locomotive engineer for CN for 21 years before moving to VIA where he had worked for the past 4 years. The LE and ICLE were qualified for their positions, met rest standards and were experienced with the territory. They had worked together as a crew on a regular basis over the previous 16 months.
On this trip, a 3rd operating crew member was in the cab. This crew member was a locomotive engineer trainee who was on this trip as part of VIA familiarization training for trainees. A 3rd person in the cab is usually seated in the jump seat located between the LE and the ICLE. When a trainee accompanies a VIA crew, signal recognition and rules compliance are responsibilities shared equally among all crew members.
The trainee was a qualified locomotive engineer. He had 22 years of railway experience, including 9 years as a locomotive engineer. He had worked as a locomotive engineer for the Ottawa Central Railway (7 years) and for CN (2 years). He had been hired as a trainee by VIA in October 2011. As part of VIA’s locomotive engineer training program, the trainee had completed several assignments between Niagara Falls and Toronto. On some of these assignments, the trainee had been paired with the LE. The trainee met fitness and rest standards.
All 3 operating crew members were based in Toronto. On the day before the accident, the crew had come on duty at 1545
Footnote 1 and had worked westward from Toronto to Niagara Falls on VIA train No. 95 before booking off duty at 2109.
[...]
To extricate the operating crew, the locomotive roof was cut away and removed. The LE, ICLE and trainee were located in the area of the locomotive cab control stand and had sustained fatal injuries.
It was determined that the LE was at the controls at the time of the accident. [emphasis added]