Section 21 (2) of the Transport Safety Investigation Act 2003 (TSI Act) empowers the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) to discontinue an investigation into a transport safety matter at any time. Section 21 (3) of the TSI Act requires the ATSB to publish a statement setting out the reasons for discontinuing an investigation.
On 13 December 2010, the ATSB commenced a safety issue Investigation into Procedures and Practices used to Provide Access to Track, NSW. Examination of the information collected during the Access to Track investigation identified significant similarities to aspects of other occurrences being investigated by the ATSB as part of the safety issue investigation of rail operations on the interstate rail line between Sydney and Melbourne, which commenced on 16 August 2011.
Accordingly the ATSB decided to examine the issues related to Access to Track as part of the broader RI-2011-015 safety issue investigation and the separate RI-2010-014 investigation was discontinued.