Today's NTSB PDF is another story of inexcusable negligence: Film Crew Trespassing on CSX Right-of-Way
The director wanted to film a dream sequence with a character lying in a bed on railway tracks. The rail company said sorry, but we don't grant filming permits. The location manager asked them again and they said really, no, we don't allow filming, maybe you could try another railway in the area?
And the film crew decided to go film on the railroad tracks anyway. The location manager refused to participate and quit the shoot in protest, but this apparently didn't dissuade them.
And they got hit by a train. In an infuriatingly predictable turn of events, a train came up on the filming location at high speed, the crew tried to run away but they were on the middle of a bridge so couldn't get away fast enough, the bed exploded into shrapnel, and the shrapnel injured six people and caused a camera assistant to fall under the wheels of the train, killing her.
Surprisingly for incidents like this, there were consequences; the director, Randall Miller, actually served time for involuntary manslaughter, the assistant director Hillary Schwartz was put on probation, and the incident spurred a movement for greater safety awareness on movie sets.
Which is... better than nothing at all coming of it, but this is one of the sadder PDFs I've read just because it was so predictable what would happen. The railway said no we won't stop the trains for you, the location manager said guys I think they really mean it... and the director somehow decided that nah it'll be fine? Why would you think it would be fine?
Some of the accidents I read about are absolute freak chance that no one could have predicted, most could have been prevented but in a way that requires the benefit of hindsight, but the worst ones are the ones that were so inevitable that they were going to kill someone, and the only thing left up to chance was who.
