Investing in Safety at Union Pacific: Railway Age CEO Perspectives on Safety

Jim Vena

Every day, we work with very large, heavy equipment to move products and materials across 23 states with gateways connecting the continent. One mistake can prevent an employee from returning home or seriously impact the communities where we operate. That is why safety is the first and most important part of our Safety, Service and Operational Excellence strategy for growth. At Union Pacific, we have a goal to become the best at safety and we are making progress to get there. We are investing in our people, changing our culture, continuing to improve our infrastructure and equipment, and using technology to propel these efforts.

Safety is not a new area of focus for us, and we have made substantial strides:

• We had zero work-related fatalities in 2023.
• In 2023, we also reduced year-over-year serious injuries by 15%.
• Serious derailments on Union Pacific’s network declined 26% in 2023 compared with 2019, while average maximum train length grew.
• And, during the past 10 years, track-related derailments declined 28%.

These results are important, and indicative of the plans we have in place, but I realize we have more work to do. 

We are investing in a safety culture where employees know they have the right to speak up if they see something unsafe, to stop a process or activity if they have concern, and to look out for one another. Our Union Pacific team researched thousands of serious safety incidents and used those findings to refresh our safety strategy. Approximately half of Union Pacific’s serious injuries are related to six choices individuals make each day on or near railroad equipment, affecting their personal safety, the safety of their colleagues and the communities we serve. 

We call these the “Go Home Safe” choices, and we rolled out new policies and training to help employees prevent these potentially life-threatening behaviors. 

In addition to changing our culture, we are also investing in technology and in our infrastructure. Technology is equipping us with information to assess risk, improving our operations and making us safer. We have thousands of wayside detection devices across our system which generate more than 16 million data points per day, helping us identify when a train should be stopped for inspection or repair, repaired at the next location, or repaired at a planned maintenance event. 

Innovation is also critical in how we build trains and the routes we traverse. We do this by simulating and replicating the forces trains experience based on the terrain they travel, and then taking that data to improve the way we build and connect trains on our network. 

We’ve put technology into the hands of our front-line employees, equipping them with mobile devices that put critical information at their fingertips. These tools include visualization capabilities that enable them to see the condition of tracks, locomotives and cars in real time. Some features help them prioritize important tasks and even give them the ability to throw switches and protect tracks. Converting highly manual processes into ones infused with technology reduces physical risks and helps our workforce adapt.

We also continue to make infrastructure investments as a normal component of safeguarding our operations for the customers and communities we serve:

• Last year, our Engineering team replaced 3.4 million ties, 5 million feet of rail, and invested in purchasing or repairing thousands of vehicles and work equipment. 
• Our Mechanical team performed 13 million inspections and completed more than three million maintenance tasks, including more than 90,000 wheelset changes. 
• Our Locomotive department performed more than 1.6 million inspections and completed 6.5 million maintenance tasks. 

We are determined to improve safety and are invested in every way. We know that as we improve our culture, practices and overall system, we will succeed and win—for the employees, customers and the communities counting on us.