Passenger/Freight Rail Collision in Greece, 2/28

[Rover]

https://apnews.com/article/greece-train-crash-thessaloniki-01cd3d48dfe384a7c0ff148d0b24a425

 

[Tlcooper44]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/28/europe/greece-train-crash-larissa-intl-hnk/

 

[TaseMeBro]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/28/europe/greece-train-crash-larissa-intl-hnk/index.html
Story was thin on details at the time of this post, but stated it was a head on collision between a freight train and a Hellenic Railways passenger train heading from Athens to Thessaloniki, with a number of injuries and confirmed fatalities.

 

[George Harris]

Picture from voanews.com
Are now saying 32 dead and 85 injured. No mention of speeds of either train. Article says 350 passengers on train, and 250 were transported the rest of the way to Thessaloniki by bus. It appears that the track is adjacent to a major highway at the point of collision. From the article:

"The two trains collided near the city of Tempe, about 380 kilometers north of the Greek capital of Athens. The passenger train was headed north from Athens to the city of Thessaloniki, while the freight train was traveling south from Thessaloniki to the city of Larissa. At least three passenger cars derailed and burst into flames."

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Occurred north of the city. Double tracks showing on Google maps. Trains were on the same track, passenger locomotive crew did see the problem. Unfortunately all 4 engineers on both trains are reported dead. 2 passenger railcars are reported crushed/disintegrated.

Job well done to the fire service. Just after midnight the call came in. They managed to get 500 people on scene.
Well organized system.

 

[Dutchrailnut]

the Station master(block operator) at one of Junctions has been arrested.

 

[The Quaking Widow]

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/01/...RU9m6BLhKRomaQPDwZzCBaYLqAD41c&smid=url-share
NYT article— should open.

 

[Ziv]

Stories like this are so sad. People just living their lives and then something goes wrong. It happened in my home state with Amtrak a few years ago.
I had looked at taking that line a week earlier but took a bus from Athens to Patras instead.

 

[joelkfla]

CNN said today that the passenger train was on the wrong track.

 

[George Harris]

CNN said today that the passenger train was on the wrong track.

Trains don't change lanes by themselves. So far, there are far more questions than answers. However, from the BBC we have the following:
1. 43 deaths found so far.
2. Four coaches derailed, the first two caught fire, almost completely destroyed, which would suggest that in the picture the coach you see at a near 90 degrees to the track is actually the third coach.
3. At this point, cause being called "human error", but the local stationmaster has been charged with manslaughter.

Based on the picture with the BBC article, the collision was on a curve with the passenger train coming out from a box shaped underpass, so that visibility along the track would have been limited. Since it appears that the passenger train was on the left hand track facing in its direction of operation, it suggests that the Greek system operates right handed. What sort of signal or train control system do they have? Are the tracks bi-directionally signaled or only signaled for normal operating direction, or are they signaled at all?

 

[TaseMeBro]

It seems like a number of news reports, as well as statements from passengers, remarked that at least a few of the passenger cars "burst into flame" nearly immediately.

I know early info isn't always accurate, but that's being reported enough I'd think there's truth to it.

As I'm totally ignorant to train engineering and construction, what might have caused that?

The passenger cars would certainly have carried materials which are combustible - fixtures, fittings, interior materials - but I'd think only the locomotive would be carrying fuel or anything volatile enough to burst into flame so quickly.

Is it likely to be fuel from the locomotive that dispersed and ignited from the violence of the collision? Hydraulic or other fluids present in the passenger cars?

 

[MARC Rider]

It seems like a number of news reports, as well as statements from passengers, remarked that at least a few of the passenger cars "burst into flame" nearly immediately.

I know early info isn't always accurate, but that's being reported enough I'd think there's truth to it.

As I'm totally ignorant to train engineering and construction, what might have caused that?

The passenger cars would certainly have carried materials which are combustible - fixtures, fittings, interior materials - but I'd think only the locomotive would be carrying fuel or anything volatile enough to burst into flame so quickly.

Is it likely to be fuel from the locomotive that dispersed and ignited from the violence of the collision? Hydraulic or other fluids present in the passenger cars?

Was the passenger train a DMU, which presumably has diesel engines and fuel tanks in multiple cars.

 

[jis]

Was the passenger train a DMU, which presumably has diesel engines and fuel tanks in multiple cars.

Only one car caught fire and it was the Restaurant Car is what I read somewhere.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

Only one car caught fire and it was the Restaurant Car is what I read somewhere.

This might not the be right time or place for levity, but in Chicago we have a term for an affliction that only affects Greek restaurants, it's called Greek Lighting...

A shame - really horrible crash that seems as if it was completely preventable.

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Stationmaster that was arrested was also called a block operator in one story. Easily could be local tower operations thing. No CTC (center traffic control) but local block control might be in effect in the is area.

 

[Willbridge]

Stationmaster that was arrested was also called a block operator in one story. Easily could be local tower operations thing. No CTC (center traffic control) but local block control might be in effect in the is area.

The old European dispatching system had the station master responsible for controlling traffic to the next station. That's the big reason that American railroaders, mainly from the GN, were sent to the Trans-Siberian in World War 1 to teach Russians the диспетчер system, in which a dispatcher can set up meets, etc. over a long distance. From what I've learned, the Tsar's railways were using the old European system. The new system was adopted by the Bolsheviks and four decades later they tried to push it on the Deutsche Reichsbahn as a Russian invention. The Germans knew otherwise.

It looks as though the Hellenic Railways are using something evolved from the old European system. The news reports are also a reminder of our different legal systems. We rarely see people arrested here for involvement with an accident. In the Anglo-Saxon sphere, accidents are usually a civil matter.

Rail union statement as reported by Reuters: "They said that their repeated calls for more permanent staff, more training, and the implementation of modern security technology had been ignored." Anonymous rail workers quoted by the news agency claimed that signals were not working on the track segment. The arrested station master claimed that there was an equipment failure.

These statements might be seen as self-interested, but the Transport Minister resigned, "saying he was taking responsibility for the state's 'long-standing failures' to fix a railway system he said was not fit for the 21st century."

The issues will be complicated by the privatization of rail operations in 2017 to the Italian State Railways (FS). The Greek government retained responsibility for the infrastructure and equipment leasing.

According to German Wikipedia, the passenger trains used on the Athens<>Salonika main line are reconditioned second-hand Italian ETR-470 emu's that were retrofitted for ETCS. They were somewhat controversial for breakdowns and electrical fires. A Greek railfan YouTube posting a month ago states: "ETCS level 1 that will be operational by next year only allows 200 km/h." [My underline.]



According to German Wikipedia:
This line is double-tracked and electrified throughout, switches and signals are set manually. At the scene of the accident, both trains ran on the western track, which was on the left for the northbound passenger train in the direction of travel and on the right for the southbound freight train in the direction of travel. [10]

Earlier on the same day, the overhead line at Paleofarsalos station had fallen onto another Intercity train, causing several delays on the line. [11]

They also included the Transport Minister's statement that the current government had taken over the railway problems only 3½ years ago, but he felt that someone should have to take responsibility.

 

[George Harris]

A few observations: The line from Athens to Thessaloniki is described in one site as mostly double track and electrified. It is the Greek system's premier main line. One site says 304 km (189 miles) and 4h8m run time. That would give an average speed of 73.5 km/hr (45.7 mph). Electrification is overhead wire, and probably 25kv. See willbridge post above for some thoughts on signaling and train control. Train was locomotive hauled and coaches, not EMU's. Freight appears to be mostly containers on flat cars. Single level. UIC vertical clearance does not allow for double stack. Exposed end of car, although not very clear, appears to have hook and screw coupling, and definitely buffers. European freight trains are normally very short by North American standards, seldom exceeding around 25 cars. This one appears to have been less. (A few year ago I ran across a study for another Western European country, discussing the practicality of running freights of 2,000 tonnes. My thought on the matter was, what is this, 1900? We have been running freights of around 8,000 to 10,000 tons since at least the beginning of dieselization.} One site stated the passenger train speed as 160 km/hr, but I seriously doubt that. That may be the ultimate maximum, but both the geometry (the cruve) of the site and the fact that they were running "wrong main" makes me think 100 km/hr or less more likely. In fact if the 4 hour run time is current, a maximum line speed of 100 to 120 km/hr should be sufficient. Condition of coaches suggests their strength is no where near US crashworthiness standards.

Overall Greek Railway system. The point of collision is a few km north of Larissa, which is just north of half way between Athens and Thessaloniki.

 

[Willbridge]

A good point about using the old equipment (photos showing graffiti covered cars). They are supposed to have enough emu's to cover the schedule.

More from comments in a Simply Railway video. At the time that he rode, two of six trains a day were operated with the emu's.

One question is whether the schedule was written for the emu's and not for the locomotive-hauled older equipment. The public schedule shows 3:58/59 for two trains making one stop (Larisa) and 4:13 for five trains making eight stops. Train 62, the last train of the evening, was scheduled for the intermediate stops.

 

[Cal]

As seen in this BBC article, the line is double tracked at the crash site which I didn't realize until now. The remains of the carriages were quite astonishing to me.

And while irrelevant to the crash, the apparent graffiti on the cars also surprised me.

 

[jamesontheroad]

Hello from Marrakech in Morocco. I flew here from Athens on Tuesday and was oblivious to the accident until the next morning. I had travelled by train from Thessaloniki to Athens about 24hrs prior to the accident, so the events have been quite upsetting for me and my partner.

The journey was part of a special Interrail adventure from Umeå, Sweden to Athens via Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. Having abandoned Twitter I created a trip thread on Mastodon with the #UmeåAthens that begins here: James Benedict Brown (@[email protected])

(Scroll through the thread for description and photos of the Greek part of the trip. Maybe if there is time and interest I’ll write up a travelogue for this forum).

The Sofia-Thessaloniki train hasn’t operated since 2018, so I took a Bulgarian train (still prefixed INT for international) to Kulata and stayed in a hotel there. The next morning I walked over the border into Greece and took a taxi to Strimon where I caught the morning train from Drama to Thessaloniki. After some sightseeing I continued to Athens.

To comment on a few things up-thread, Athens-Thessaloniki is indeed Greece’s most important and also most potentially profitable line, so under new Italian ownership, Hellenic Train have made huge efforts to develop and attract custom. The fastest daily trips are two daily round trips with Italian ETR400 series Pendolino EMU train sets, which finally do the trip in under 4hrs (the magic time to become viable against airport transfers, checkin and flight time).

In addition to two daily departures with ETR Pendolinos, there are usually seven daily departures with locomotives hauling nine carriages. They usually take 4hr10m. On Sunday I took such a train in the opposite direction and include photos here.

The train involved in the accident was the 19:30 departure from Athens which has approximately 1hr delay en route. There used to be an overnight trip with car carriers for passengers’ cars but it hasn’t operated in a long time.

The locomotive hauled trains are fast, comfortable and very smooth. Although the carriages involved in the crash were graffitied, this is less common on this premium route than on other less economically important routes. The photos of my train show a rather clever new vinyl wrap with triangular patterns which is extremely hard for vandals to “tag” because it renders any graffiti illegible.

Regarding signalling, there is none. Investments are ongoing to introduce ECTS but currently station masters are responsible for communicating with the next station master and releasing traffic. The station master concerned has been arrested and according to state broadcaster ERT made a partial confession. However the Minister of Transport has resigned and unions have been forceful in defending the individual as having been the victim of a broken and understaffed system.

My love and sympathy is with the Greek people at this time.

 

[Ziv]

As seen in this BBC article, the line is double tracked at the crash site which I didn't realize until now. The remains of the carriages were quite astonishing to me.

And while irrelevant to the crash, the apparent graffiti on the cars also surprised me.

Everything in Greece is coverered in graffiti. Even new rail cars are tagged within days. They even tagged the Orthodox Church next to my hotel this year. On my last trip churches were still sacrosanct. No graffiti on any of them then.

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

As seen in this BBC article, the line is double tracked at the crash site which I didn't realize until now. The remains of the carriages were quite astonishing to me.

And while irrelevant to the crash, the apparent graffiti on the cars also surprised me.

In the pictures you posted you can see the steel plates that was cargo. Trains vs steel plates here in the USA, the steel plates seem to cause extra damage.

 

[jis]

Today the Greek Railways and Athens Metro is on strike protesting lack of safety systems, as a direct consequence of the accident. It made for an interesting experience getting from the airport to the hotel even though I had pre-booked airport transfer.

 

[Just-Thinking-51]

Yeah a rail strike would make it interesting getting to your hotel.

The traffic control system is the last thing finished during a upgrade. Does anyone know if there a real delay or just the normal install and testing required for a rebuilt line. The traffic on the line is reported to be slower than it will be after the PTC is installed. That’s expected, but is there any real delays in installing and testing?

 

[Bob Dylan]

Everything in Greece is coverered in graffiti. Even new rail cars are tagged within days. They even tagged the Orthodox Church next to my hotel this year. On my last trip churches were still sacrosanct. No graffiti on any of them then.

Sounds like New York City and LA!!!