According to a federal audit by the Federal Transit Administration, New York City Transit doesn’t follow its own safety protocols, leading to dangerous and even deadly conditions for track workers.

It follows the death of track worker Hilarion Joseph near Herald Square in late November. He was struck by a D train while flagging and warning oncoming trains that work is being done, according to officials.

“My brother was very happy to work there,” Angela Joseph, his sister, said. “He was very jolly, excited.”

Just shy of Joseph’s first anniversary when the father of six lost his life, his sister says the MTA should use cameras to keep those workers safe.

“It’s a very dangerous job. They know that. The MTA knows that,” she said. “That’s why they need to put those body cameras in the tunnel.”

The FTA audit and directive also citing a worker critically struck in June at the Hoyt-Schermerhorn station.

In all, 38 near-miss events in 2023, up 58% from the prior year. That’s incidents where a worker could have been struck. And 19 of the 38 involved the agency not following its own procedures.

The incidents included trains running through red signals and doors opening on the wrong side of the subway car.

Interim Transit President Demetrius Crichlow wrote a letter to the FTA saying they’ll appeal the directives.

“We strongly dispute FTA’s view that NYCT has somehow been negligent when it comes to addressing the safety of track workers, one of our most essential priorities,” he wrote.

Crichlow noted it was unfair to compare the increase in incidents year over year because less work was being done during the pandemic and that the 38 near-misses represented 0.03% of work being done along the tracks.

But Transport Workers Union (TWU) International President John Samuelsen says it just shows the MTA is putting performance over safety.

“Under Janno Lieber, the MTA has put a massive emphasis on on-time train performance rather than worker safety,” Samuelsen said.

He says work can be done safely without having to shut down service, but right now, his members shouldn’t be doing that kind of work.

“There’s no chance, no chance that any TA boss, even if there is downward pressure from MTA Headquarters should have the ability to compel a track worker to follow an unsafe work order and not go home in one piece to his family,” Samuelsen said.

That didn’t happen for Joseph.

“Every time I go up [on] the train, he comes flooding back to me,” his sister said. “Because this should not have happened.”

The audit also criticizes the New York State Public Transportation Safety Board for not providing enough oversight over the MTA. Meanwhile, the death of Joseph and the incident when a track worker was struck in June are still under investigation by the NTSB.