OSE’s management consultant, Panagiotis Terezakis, gave his own explanation for the tragic accident in Tempi, speaking to SKAI’s Atariastos.

As he pointed out, “until 2010, 2011, 2012 there was remote control in OSE from Kiato to the airport and from Athens to Thessaloniki and Promachona. Gradually, from 2010 onwards, the system crashed due to various reasons and did not recover.

There have been staff reductions, and we are also suffering greatly from cable theft. At first glance, we can say that when remote control goes down, so does security.

But again, even without them, there are protocols that if followed there is no question of leading to such tragic accidents.

Larissa has a local signaling control panel. This means that at some distance before the station and at some distance after the station, we have light signals etc. that show the presence of the train.

Why the stationmaster was unable to follow the train throughout its journey is a matter being investigated by the investigator and experts.

For 5.5km after leaving Larissa, he could have seen that he put the train on the wrong track and stopped it.

By the time he went to Larissa, he had spent a year training, but had no other experience as a station master. He was in Larissa for about a month and for a while he was with another station master on the shift.

The train driver must listen to what the stationmaster tells him. He could ask for an additional clarification but it is not the driver’s obligation. This is not in the protocol.

The conversation is open and the station master in Litochoro was also listening to them. But it was not said in the conversation that it goes in reverse, in a downward line. Also there was no telegram that there is traffic on a single line due to works”