Whilst doing my PTS I was surprised to find that on the DC conductor rail railway trains don't carry some kind of cover to place over the conductor rail to provide additional protection in the event of having to step over an electified section in an emergency. (I was told the term for these are juice mats) I am sure I saw one of these in a LT depot once. Can someone with far more railway experience than me explain why they are deemed unnecessary? Similarly I was also surprised that the wearing of electrictians safety gloves is not mandatory when walking on or near the conductor rail or the numerous live areas of a berthed EMU at track level. Again I am sure there are very sound reasons why not but would like to know!
Thanks for any input.
If you mean walking over the conductor rail with the public (train evacuation) or during engineering works then you would get the line isolated first anyway and lay a shirt circuiting bar as a fail safe protection. You wouldn't ever take the public over live sections of juice rail.
If you mean p-way walking about on open lines then I guess it's safer not to lay the matts as it takes longer to move it when a train approaches.
As for gloves, no one working around the live rail would be putting their hands near it and those working around trains beneath the sole bar would know what equipment is live and not too touch. Again you wouldn't go near shoe fuses and other live parts unless the unit was fully isolated in some way.
The NCL stations all have high voltage gloves for emergencies kept in a cupboard on the platform but I certainly wouldn't touch anything in contact with the 3rd rail until I had put the bar down and got an isolation.
