Workers across Greece were due to strike on Wednesday to demand answers a year after the country’s deadliest train crash, which killed 57 people and injured dozens more.
The head-on collision sparked mourning and days of angry protest that blamed employee failures and an unsafe rail system for the fiery crash on February 28, 2023.
A definitive account of what happened and who may be to blame has not been delivered, with investigators in a formal investigation not due until March 8.
“One year later, we are back on the streets to shout that we do not forget,” said civil servants union Adedy. “Those responsible for the tragedy have yet to answer for their criminal acts.”
Greek civil servants were due to go on a 24-hour strike with other unions, including air traffic controllers, taxi drivers and public transport workers, who are also protesting the high cost of living.
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A memorial service was held for those lost on Sunday and relatives plan to gather at the crash site on Wednesday.
The disaster occurred when a freight train and a passenger train carrying more than 350 passengers — mostly students — collided near a tunnel outside the central city of Larissa.
Passengers described being trapped between broken carriages and burning debris as the train sped by. They broke windows to try to escape.
The flames left several bodies charred beyond recognition, and a missing woman was never found.
The tragedy sparked three days of national mourning and mass protests in several cities, with protesters throwing stones at the offices of the Italian railway operator, Hellenic Train.
But almost four months later, the Conservative government was comfortably re-elected.
In an interview with Agence France-Presse, Maria Karystianou, who lost her 19-year-old daughter in the accident, said she “doesn’t believe” in Greek justice and will submit her case to the European Court of Human Rights.
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Although 34 railroad employees and executives face possible charges in the disaster, a trial is not expected to begin until June.
Complaints about illegal cargo
Relatives have appointed their own experts in the case, arguing that official investigators wasted time and overlooked vital evidence.
At a news conference Monday, the relatives’ panel of experts said state officials had failed to investigate the cause of a raging fire that broke out immediately after the crash.
“At least five of the 57 people died as a result of this fire,” committee member George Vlasopoulos said.
Karystianou has said there was a “huge” explosion after the collision that caused chemical burns to rescuers.
“It is certain that the freight train was carrying illegal cargo. We found substances used to adulterate fuel,” he told AFP.
In a speech to the European Parliament this month, she said the government had “attempted to falsify and cover up incriminating evidence”.
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Potentially valuable CCTV footage was deleted two weeks after the disaster without being evaluated, and the site was bulldozed and paved over days after the crash, family experts said.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis promised a year ago that the tragedy would be investigated “fully”.
“Everything shows that the drama was, unfortunately, mainly due to tragic human error,” Mitsotakis said in a televised speech after visiting the site of the disaster.
He later apologized for the accident and said it would improve rail safety in Greece.
The railroad is plagued with problems
The responsible transport minister at the time, Kostas Karamanlis, told a parliamentary inquiry this month that the staff on duty were to blame.
Had they not “serially broken” safety regulations, the crash would not have happened, he claimed.
Karamanlis, who resigned and was later re-elected as an MP, argued that even automated systems would not necessarily have prevented the accident “because these systems need people to operate them”.
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Safety improvements have begun since then, but they are slow and piecemeal. Several failures that led to this disaster remain uncorrected.
For decades, Greece’s 2,552-kilometer (1,585-mile) rail network has been plagued by mismanagement, poor maintenance and outdated equipment.
A safety supervisor resigned the year before the crash, warning that infrastructure upgrades pending since 2016 were still incomplete and that it was unsafe for trains to travel at speeds of up to 200 kilometers per hour.
“The destruction of Tempe was the result of state negligence and general corruption, not human error,” Lysimachos Papazoglou, who lost his 22-year-old son, told reporters on Monday.
Source: AFP