The investigating judges responsible for the investigation into the Brétigny-sur-Orge railway disaster in Essonne, which left seven dead and dozens injured in July 2013, have ordered a trial against the SNCF and a railroad worker, announced Friday the floor of Evry.
Trial during the year 2021
Both are referred to the criminal court for homicide and involuntary injuries. The 31-year-old railroader was at the head of a track inspection brigade at the time of the derailment. It was he who had carried out the last verification, eight days before the disaster. "The trial is planned for the year 2021," said the prosecution in a statement.
On July 12, 2013, the Intercités Paris-Limoges train had derailed at the Brétigny-sur-Orge station in Essonne when a splint - a sort of large clip holding two consecutive rails - had pivoted, causing the accident. The toll of one of the worst railway disasters in France in the past twenty years was heavy: three dead among the passengers on the train, four among those waiting on the platform, and dozens of injured. The investigation excluded "any fault of the driver or any malicious act," said the prosecution in a statement.
"Maintenance faults"
Last November, the prosecution concluded that the train had derailed due to "maintenance failures", an "insufficient monitoring system", and "failures in the organization of human resources". During the five years of the investigation, all expert reports ordered by the courts concluded that the train had derailed due to a poorly maintained piece of track which had disintegrated over time.
SNCF, for its part, considers that the assembly in question failed suddenly due to a defect in the steel, and therefore that the accident was unpredictable - a hypothesis that would clear it.