Greek Transportation Station Manager Arrested, Charged With Manslaughter After Train Crash Leaves 57 People Dead
Greece’s transportation minister resigned and a station manager was arrested after a devastating train crash left 57 people dead, RadarOnline.com has learned.
Transport Minister Kostas Karamanlis resigned on Thursday, two days after a commercial train carrying 350 passengers crashed into a freight train in Larissa, Greece.
More than 50 others have been hospitalized with serious injuries. Officials predict the death toll will continue to rise in the coming days.
"We can see that there are more people there," Yiannis Artopios, Temple’s Fire Service spokesperson, reported Thursday. "Unfortunately, they are in a very bad condition because of the collision."
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis spoke out to announce Tuesday’s devastating train crash was most likely the result of “human error.”
"Everything in this tragedy points, unfortunately, mainly to human error,” he said during a televised speech. "We will work so that this 'never again' that I heard in Larissa will not remain an empty word."
Meanwhile, the 59-year-old station manager in charge at the time of the crash has been arrested and charged with multiple counts of manslaughter and causing serious physical harm through negligence.
The station manager, upon his arrest on Wednesday, reportedly denied any wrongdoing and claimed the two trains were traveling in opposite directions on the same track due to a “possible technical failure.”
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The nation’s railway workers’ associations have also since gone on strike in protest of their allegedly poor working conditions and Greece’s subpar rail system.
"Justice will do its own work,” Prime Minister Mitsotakis said while calling for an investigation into the circumstances that led to the accident. “Responsibilities will be assigned.”
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Hellenic Train, the Italian private rail operator that owned the crashed passenger train, has subsequently canceled more than one dozen other routes as they focus on their "primary and exclusive concern" in completing the ongoing evacuation and rescue process.
At least six of the 66 passengers hospitalized in the crash remain in intensive care as their life-threatening injuries are addressed.