Students from Isis District State High School, Childers State School and St Joseph’s Primary School recently took a field trip from the classroom to learn about cane train safety.
As an initiative for Queensland Road Safety Week, Childers Police partnered with the Isis Central Sugar Mill and the Isis Building Safer Communities Action Team to organise a fully loaded cane train to be parked in the centre of town.
The scene was complete with a small car and emergency services vehicles to simulate what the response might look like, should a crash with a cane train occur.
Sergeant Geoff Fay, Officer in Charge of Childers Police and Paul Nicol from Isis Central Sugar Mill spoke to students about the dangers of cane trains.
Primary school students were taught about the need to take care around train crossings and railway tracks.
They were asked to look out for cane trains when in the car and let their parents know if they see one approaching a crossing.
Learner drivers and potential learner drivers were taught about the responsibilities the driver of a car has in relation to level crossings.
Students were then able to compare the size of a small car to a cane train and learned that a fully loaded train can take up to one kilometre to stop.
The excitement of the day was the rare opportunity to get up close to and even sit in the driver’s seat of a cane train.
Even Police Mascot Cluedo managed to sneak aboard.
However, the message of the day was clear that pedestrians and drivers alike need to take particular care around cane trains, tracks and level crossings.
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