I suggest that those speculating on the relative safety of remote control vs conventional operation look at FRA's report to Congress on remote control operation, which ws issued last yer (I think it's available on the FRA website), which has loads of information. The bottom line is that the two modes were equivalent from a safety standpoint. I would guess that the situation has improved in favor of remote control since the data on which the report is based was collected, as remote control operations became more routine and familiar, but FRA hasn't issued any updated data.