On the evening of February 28, 2023, a tragic collision occurred when passenger train IC62, en route from Athens to Thessaloniki with over 350 passengers, crashed head-on with freight train 63503 traveling from Thessaloniki to Larissa on the same track. This catastrophic event became the deadliest train accident in Greece’s history, resulting in the loss of 57 lives, with 56 identified through biological material and one missing person’s sample not found. Additionally, at least 85 individuals were injured, 25 of them critically.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis swiftly attributed the accident to a “primarily human error” by the Larissa station master and commended Minister Costas Ah. Karamanlis for taking “political responsibility” by resigning.

However, concerns about the railway’s safety had been raised long before the accident. On April 27, 2022, Christos Katsoulis, then head of the railway network’s signalling and safety project committee, resigned because of these issues. The Panhellenic Association of Traction Personnel had also alerted the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport, the Railway Regulatory Authority, and Hellenic Train about the deteriorating railway conditions, lack of maintenance, and the malfunctioning of the automatic control system designed to prevent such human errors. Days before the tragedy, railway workers had ominously warned of the risks to human lives, criticising the complacency towards safety concerns. Remarkably, just 10 days before the crash, the minister had dismissed safety concerns in Parliament as “disgraceful.”

The aftermath raised questions about the freight’s cargo, containing substances that could exacerbate a fire, as identified by experts representing the victims’ families. The decision to cordon off the crash site came under scrutiny, with the Fire Service attributing responsibility to Christos Triandopoulos, the Undersecretary for Climate Crisis and Civil Protection.

The parliamentary inquiry into the accident saw the ruling majority decline to summon key witnesses, including the former president of the train drivers, the former head of the Hellenic Railways Organisation (OSE), and the ex-managing director of TRAINOSE, which was acquired by Hellenic Train following contentious contracts. Despite these significant oversights, the government determined that political figures were not criminally liable, a decision met with demands from both the opposition and the victims’ families for accountability and legal action.

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