In the central city of Larissa on Thursday, a station master who was on duty when Greece’s deadliest train catastrophe occurred will give testimony on the tragedy that left the nation in mourning and lost hundreds of lives.
The 59-year-old will testify before a prosecutor to explain why a passenger train with more than 350 people on board was permitted to travel several kilometres on the same track as a freight train.
Around midnight on Tuesday, two trains collided near a tunnel outside Larissa. A third carriage caught fire, trapping those inside, and two carriages were crushed.
Costas Bargiotas, a senior orthopaedic surgeon at Larissa General Hospital, told Skai TV that the train was full of young people in their 20s and was a student train.
“The carriages folded like paper. That was very shocking,” he remarked.
It was a “terrible train accident without precedent” in Greece, according to Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who will run for re-election this year with voting expected in April. He also pledged that the tragedy would be “fully” investigated.
