our workNetwork Rail / Life-saving lessons for classrooms
Following the success of Horrifying Effects, our multi-award-winning campaign highlighting the devastating consequences of electrical safety incidents on the railway, we were presented with a new challenge.
How do you use the same creative platform to deliver a potentially life-saving message to children?
4,000 child trespass incidents every year
It’s always about the positive impact…
77 children risk their lives on the railway every week
Representing 20% of all trespass
Telling tales about trauma - without triggering trauma…
The graphic realism that made Horrifying Effects so powerful just isn't appropriate for the classroom. But simply softening the message risked losing its impact. The challenge was to create something that lives forever in the minds of young people – like the public information films created in the 70s and 80s did for previous generations – without giving them nightmares.
Some truly scary stats
Every year, around 4,000 rail trespass incidents involve children and young people under the age of 18. That's roughly 77 children putting themselves at risk every week, representing around 20% of all rail trespass incidents nationally. The danger increases during the warmer months too, with more than half of all child trespass incidents taking place between April and August.
With rail safety becoming a compulsory part of the PSHE curriculum from September 2026, Network Rail asked for a suite of educational resources that could help schools tackle the subject in a way that was engaging, memorable and age appropriate.
Softening the gore for older children
Working closely with Network Rail and We Communications (Network Rail’s educational advisors), we developed a suite of films for students aged 9 to 16, supported by classroom-ready teaching resources.
For secondary school pupils aged 11 to 16, we took two of the existing Horrifying Effects films - one exploring the dangers of the overhead lines, the other showing the electric rail - and created an edit of each for KS3 and KS4, dialling the shock up appropriately for the very oldest audience. This was supported by new, age-appropriate content from our favourite NHS burns expert Nicole Lee. The challenge was to retain the emotional impact and seriousness of the original campaign while making the content suitable for classroom use – finding the sweet spot between impact and scarring young people for life.
Through careful editing and age-appropriate storytelling, the edits for older children still confronted the consequences of electrical risk without relying on the full graphic detail of the original campaign.
A colourful approach for younger children
Showing older Key Stage 2 children any version of the Horrifying Effects campaign would be completely inappropriate. So instead, we worked with animators to create a brand-new film specifically for them. Using animation allowed us to explore the dangers of the railway in a way that was engaging, accessible and memorable, while remaining appropriate for our younger audiences.
Watch this space for results
It's still early days. While the films are already available to schools, the full programme will come into its own when rail safety becomes a compulsory part of the PSHE curriculum in September 2026. Only then will we begin to see the true reach and impact of the work.
But by giving teachers engaging, ready-to-use resources and helping young people understand the risks before they encounter them in the real world, the foundations are in place for a safer generation of railway users.
Production credits
This series of films is a love letter to the craft and graft of the film industry – we couldn’t have made it without a super-talented team of practical effects specialists and expert first responders.
Production company – Space
Producer – Matt Nelson
Director – Dominic Joyce
DOP – Dominic Joyce
Visual Effects – Matt Wood
NHS Specialist Burns Nurse – Nicole Lee
Special Effects Make-Up & Prosthetics – Shaune Harrison & Paula Anne Booker-Harrison
Animation - Jonny Eveson & Lindsey Williams at Chicken Fruit