FRA considering testing train personnel for sleep apnea

The FRA is considering a regulation which would require testing for sleep apnea for all train operations personnel.  Sleep apnea is a condition where a person's airway become obstructed during sleep, usually by soft tissues in the nasal passage, mouth, and/or neck.  This results in interruptions in sleep and poor oxygen intake during sleep, with the net result being that the sleep apnea sufferer experiences poor quality sleep and feels fatigued even after a full night' rest.

The reason that the FRA is concerned about the effects of sleep apnea on train operations personnel is that fatigue has been a factor in many serious transportation related accident, including train accidents.  In this blog, we have also discussed how sleep apnea and fatigue causes trucking accidents.  Tired truck drivers have caused many accidents, and as a result, in an effort to minimize truck accidents, drivers must limit the number of hours that they are behind the wheel and keep track of their duty hours in a log book.

Since the relationship between fatigue and mass transit accidents is clear, and it is well known that untreated sleep apnea causes fatigue, testing for this condition is a smart safety idea.