Human error. There was a train stopped in the railway (maybe because it had an issue, still to be cleared). The system knew of this, so it put a red light which was being respected by the other trains to avoid a crash.
The second train, was waiting in a red light but at a certain moment, a human operator told the train driver to ignore the red light and move. The train driver then started the train despite the red light and this is the end result.
He says that around 8:30am this morning, the LZB controlling system failed due to communications issues, leaving no coverage for just over 60km of the track, which in turn triggered an automatic stop for six trains on that stretch.
But around 8:36, the Adif control centre issued a manual instruction to override the warning and let the traffic resume.
He heavily suggests that this “inexplicable” decision should not have been made, as trains should have remained under strict orders not to move.
Based on my experience with automated systems that sounds like a situation where the operator has to routinely ignore the red light because it doesn’t work correctly.
Human error. There was a train stopped in the railway (maybe because it had an issue, still to be cleared). The system knew of this, so it put a red light which was being respected by the other trains to avoid a crash.
The second train, was waiting in a red light but at a certain moment, a human operator told the train driver to ignore the red light and move. The train driver then started the train despite the red light and this is the end result.
Any system in the modern day that relies on one person seeing a light or else 68 people die feels like it has some corners cut somewhere.
The Guardian
Just be cautious that the info is from the same minister who apparently*-incorrectly blamed Iryo for the Adamuz crash at first.
*: the report into Adamuz is late & not yet published.
Based on my experience with automated systems that sounds like a situation where the operator has to routinely ignore the red light because it doesn’t work correctly.
Yikes someone didn’t sleep well that night.