A senior state investigator probing Greece’s worst train tragedy resigned Wednesday, with ongoing confusion about the causes of a huge fireball that killed some survivors.
Christos Papadimitriou, head of the state accident investigation agency’s railway sector, said he was resigning for “personal and family reasons” after saying in interviews that he had received threats over his work.
Fifty-seven people, most of them young students, died in February 2023 when a passenger train and a freight train collided in Tempe, central Greece, after being allowed to run on the same track.
Some survivors – up to seven according to state accident investigators but around 30 according to families – were killed by an 80-metre (260-feet) fireball after the collision.
Papadimitriou on February 27 headed the presentation of a report in Athens that pointed to the “possible presence” of an “unknown fuel” that could have caused the fireball that has divided experts.
On Monday, he said in separate televised interviews that this conclusion had been reached “at the insistence” of European train safety officials and had to be further investigated.
“I received threats because I continued to look into it,” he told Skai TV, adding that the fireball theory had been based on “questionable” methodology that was “not universally accepted” by experts.
Papadimitriou noted that an alternative theory involved train engine silicone oils, and if this were true “all trains” running in Europe” could be “dangerous.”
The accident has sparked sweeping strikes and hundreds of protests in Greece and abroad this year.
It also brought about two votes of no confidence last year and in March that the conservative government overcame.
The train’s Italian-owned operator Hellenic Train has denied knowledge of any illegal cargo on the freight train.
Over 40 people have been prosecuted, including the local station master responsible for routing the trains.
A trial into the accident is not expected before the end of the year.
Source: AFP
