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Two people are standing trial in Galicia on Wednesday over a deadly train crash in Spain that killed 80 people.
More than 140 others were injured when a high-speed train derailed near Santiago de Compostela in July 2013.
An investigation revealed that the Alvia 04155 train from Madrid was travelling 179 km/h along a stretch of track with an 80 km/h speed limit.
The train derailed and crashed into a wall four kilometres before it reached the city. It was the worst rail disaster in Spain since 1972.
Investigators also found that the driver had been talking to the conductor on his mobile phone just moments before the accident.
The driver and the former director of security for Spain’s railway network (Adif) are standing trial accused of "homicide resulting from serious professional negligence".
Victims’ associations have accused Adif of using the driver as a scapegoat and failing to use appropriate signalling or automatic breaking systems. The company was eventually charged by authorities over the crash in 2016
From what I remember, he was on the phone with the conductor and on the radio with dispatch, as the train was going to call at a different platform in Santiago de Compostela.
Does not mean it was prohibited or that he was wrong using it.
Even in the UK drivers talk to the train managers , on the move , using the train internal comms systems ( we can call it a phone can’t we ?) and regularly talk to signallers , on the move , using GSMR - which is a mobile phone at the end of the day .
I remember that incident, the train was going faster than the speed limit for the line, there was talk of the driver liked to push the limit of his train and was warned by his colleague.
The case rests on two points, was it the driver going too fast ignoring all rail safety common sense or did the train accelerated itself overriding the limitations of the software ?
The Spanish legal is notoriously slow, 9 years is certainly taking the biscuit.
It seems very strange that they would prosecute these people almost ten years after the accident. It does not take almost ten years to investigate an accident and decide who to prosecute. Surely if they were going to be prosecuted it should have been done within a couple of months of the accident. So it makes me suspicious of why they have suddenly decided to now. It seems to me like they are possibly trying to get someone prosecuted before the ten year anniversary of the crash which is when it will probably receive some sort of media coverage again remembering the victims. I do not know enough about Spain and the Spanish Railways and the safety systems to fully comment but it does kind of look like they are possibly using the driver and director as scapegoats so that they can say they have prosecuted someone for it before the ten year anniversary comes.
as mentioned before, the Spanish legal system is very slow. It is of course possible that it was rushed now that its 10 years since. One is certainly surprised that this case is not given more priority and no lessons learned from the accident (?).
as mentioned before, the Spanish legal system is very slow. It is of course possible that it was rushed now that its 10 years since. One is certainly surprised that this case is not given more priority and no lessons learned from the accident.
The case rests on two points, was it the driver going too fast ignoring all rail safety common sense or did the train accelerated itself overriding the limitations of the software ?
Ever so possible except he has been a driving for a long time would have been able to judge the speed, the crash was at least twice the track speed limit.
Does not mean it was prohibited or that he was wrong using it.
Even in the UK drivers talk to the train managers , on the move , using the train internal comms systems ( we can call it a phone can’t we ?) and regularly talk to signallers , on the move , using GSMR - which is a mobile phone at the end of the day .
Interesting comments about GSMR; my understanding was that drivers were expected to bring their train to a stand before initiating a GSMR call - I may be wrong!
•Distraction due to communication on internal train phone.
•Tunnels on approach to location of accident - hard to judge speed or would impair realising speed was too fast.
•NO SAFETY SYSTEM to give warning or intervene from a very high speed down to a low speed for the curve.
Could it have happened with another individual driving under the same circumstances? A driver distracted at a crucial time?
If the answer is Yes, the railway system was open to the same mistake being made, then it is the railway that is at fault, and a scapegoat is being found instead.
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Interesting comments about GSMR; my understanding was that drivers were expected to bring their train to a stand before initiating a GSMR call - I may be wrong!
Only use it when "safe to do so". Stop if necessary. I prefer to be at a stand and will delay answering if I'm stopping soon and call back then.
If I use it on the move, I put the brake on so if it becomes a longer conversation the train will slow down and eventually stop.
You do lose Situational Awareness when talking on a phone be that an internal call on the train - cab to cab, or an external GSM-R call, or even making a PA. I have known more than one station overrun occur when a driver was making a PA.
Interesting comments about GSMR; my understanding was that drivers were expected to bring their train to a stand before initiating a GSMR call - I may be wrong!
At my TOC we can call the signaller when running under green aspects, and not slowing for speed restrictions or stations, and the driver should judge if the call needs to be right now or can wait until at a stand.
Anyone else, such as control, you need to be at a stand.
If this was the accident on a new High Speed line close to the point where it joined a traditional line, wasn't the comment made at the time that there were several tunnels close together, with mouths all looking much like each other, and nothing to remind the driver that after the last one you needed to be braking -- and he possibly did not realise this was the last one?
If I remember correctly, the driver got distracted by a call from control telling him that the train was being routed into an unusual platform, and this meant he had to consult some paperwork (not sure of the details; maybe it he had to consult the train manager too).
All this happened towards the end of the new high-speed section, and the driver didn't realise that he had already got to the point of transition to the old curving track with a much lower speed limit.
The infrastructure was deficient, because it allowed the train to reach the end of high-speed section at a ridiculous over-speed without automatically braking the train before the curve. The speed control system on the high-speed line was designed for when the high-speed line continued on its own new alignment,but that continuation had not been opened at the time. So trains were diverting onto the old line, where speed control was the responsibility of the driver.
Delaying a reduction from a high speed is particularly dangerous, because a few seconds delay in hitting the brakes means the train has got a lot closer to the restriction. The TGV crash in eastern France was in a similar situation, although in that case it was a test run that intentionally exceeded the permitted speed, and I think the train protection had been disabled.
Interesting comments about GSMR; my understanding was that drivers were expected to bring their train to a stand before initiating a GSMR call - I may be wrong!
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