I've been following this sad story - a speeding train from Madrid, Spain to Ferrol derails, killing 80 people and the death toll is still rising.When I heard this news one question came to mind... why the fuck didn't the train automatically slow down?
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Automatic Train Control (ATC) is pretty standard technology as far as trains go and so it should be.
Basically, as a train approaches a part of the track where it needs to slow down, the driver will get some kind of warning. If they don't respond to the warning within a certain amount of time, THE TRAIN AUTOMATICALLY SLOWS DOWN!
I've always thought it was pretty standard that trains had this tech on board, let's face it, you don't need a driver on board at all, trains go in straight lines on tracks, so a driver is pretty much redundant.
Not seen the crash? Watch it here:
After looking into it a bit more, I found this on The Guardian which talks about the European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) which should be in use on Spanish lines... BUT the automatic stuff only kicks into action at certain points on the line. And in particular this part of the track (already well known to be a dangerously sharp curve) was NOT managed by ERTMS but a Spanish safety system called ASFA.
The latest is the the driver has been detained and I reckon they'll end up putting him in prison for dangerous train driving. He has been quoted before the crash took place repeating "we're human, we're human" pointing towards the fact that he knows he messed up but it was an accident. But hey, some poor bastard WILL be taking the blame for this, a lot of people have died and people wanna see someone take the fall for this. It doesn't help that he posted pictures on Facebook account showing him driving at 200km/h:
Now I'm not defending the driver at all, but guess what, accidents happen, especially accidents down to human error. This is a very sad accident but I hope that they actually get to the bottom as to why the train didn't automatically slow down rather than publicly punishing this guy, just so that people can see 'justice'. For all we know the driver may well have been pissed out of his face or trying to get home in time for dinner, in that case, yeah he fucked up. But how about making sure the technology is fully operational at dangerous parts of the track so that this shit doesn't happen?
Why the fuck have the technology out there and not use it on a part of track known to be dangerous?
~ Cee
