MADRID: Spain will conduct a review its railway network after a train derailed last month killing 79 people, Minister of Public Works Ana Pastor said Friday.
“We are carrying out a general review of all protocols and all security systems, as well as speed limits. When I say all, it is of the entire railway network,” she told a parliamentary panel about the July 24 crash.
“We are analysing the network. And we will take decisions that improve security based on this analysis,” she added.
The train was hurtling around a bend at 179 kph (111 mph), more than twice the speed limit, when it leapt off the tracks near the northwestern city of Santiago de Compostela, according to its data recording “black boxes”.
The driver, 52-year-old Francisco Jose Garzon Amo, was on the telephone to the on-board conductor and stopped speaking just 11 seconds before the train flew off the tracks.
Garzon has been provisionally charged with 79 counts of reckless homicide. He has been released under court supervision while an investigation into the crash continues.
Railway officials say the track where the train crashed was not equipped with the automatic braking systems in place on some high-speed lines and that it was therefore left up to the driver to brake.
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