Why didn't anyone stop the train going to hell?

• Bejís A passenger on the train trapped by the fire, to the driver: "Please, do something, get us out of here"

They could not imagine the 48 passengers who got on the

on Tuesday at 4:22 p.m., when it left the

, that they were going straight to hell.

and

had been evicted since noon

, the train continued its course and even made a stop in

.

The machine continued forward and first ran into dense smoke and, shortly after, was engulfed in a setting in flames, in the forest fire that is devastating the

(

).

No one explains why (or who allowed) a train with passengers to enter a place besieged by fire, despite the fact that two hours before departure the alert had led to the evacuation of two municipalities.

The train driver, from Aragon and with several years of experience, acted with prudence and professionalism, according to the unions, who directly blame

for not having suspended rail traffic.

sources

They confirm that traffic was not cut off at the point where the accident occurred and point out that control of the railway infrastructure, the tracks, corresponds to Adif.

For its part, Adif does not confirm why that area was not cut off.

At the end of this Wednesday, at the insistence of this medium, he provided, as an explanation, that the previous train, the one at 12:13 p.m., passed without problem and that no one informed them of the incident, until the call from the driver herself .

They do not provide more details because, they say, the case is already "judicialized."

Fire extinction work in Bejís.Domenech CastellóEFE

The train stopped moving between

and

because it was very close to the fire, and the driver decided to turn back since she believed she could not cross the area.

Nor is the performance of this professional, who suffers minor injuries and had an anxiety crisis, clear.

According to the version of the train drivers' union and Renfe, the driver called the central to ask if she could go back because, as it was a single track, she had to ask for permission to avoid a possible accident.

As soon as she had the green light, she proceeded to go through the cars to reach the second cabin, which is at the other end of the train, and take the opposite direction, away from the fire.

However, this version differs from the one provided to this newspaper by

, 30 years old, passenger of the train.

«I went to the driver and asked him what was happening and if he was going to go through that area.

She replies that yes, that we continue the march and that there is no problem.

After this, I am calm.

I assume that the train will go around the fire from another place.

But after about 20 minutes, we all begin to notice how the temperature of the car begins to rise, smoke enters... We look out the windows and see that the flames are literally next to us.

I access the driver again and tell her: 'Please, do something, get us out of here.'

The driver, at that moment, completely loses her temper.

She comes out of the back cabin and starts saying that she doesn't know what to do, that she is waiting for orders from superiors, that she can't do anything, that the train is blocked...

[after the passengers activated the emergency lever]».

Other passengers complete the story: the driver stops the train and tries to activate the lever to return in the opposite direction, but realizes that it is impossible and begins to run from one end of the wagon to the other, towards the locomotive behind;

the train advances about five meters, moves about three seconds and locks up again.

The passengers experienced a Dantesque situation: tongues of fire hit the window panes, the heat reached them and the train was stopped in the middle of they did not know where, according to relatives of the victims.

The passage of the driver to get out of the deadly trap of the fire would have been interpreted by some passenger as an escape.

That, together with the impressive situation, caused panic to break loose and some of the passengers chose to open the doors with the emergency button.

"He made the flames enter the wagons with force," according to relatives of the victims.

From there, chaos broke out: there were those who jumped onto the tracks;

others who, after burning, got back on the train... Several walked towards neighboring towns;

A five-year-old girl got lost on the tracks...

The consequence has been 20 injuries of varying severity.

Yesterday, according to sources from the

, there were five people admitted to the

(four women, one in critical condition, and one man) with burns and a woman admitted to the

who had to be operated on. an ankle

The authorities, at the moment, do not clarify the situation either.

The president of the

,

, pointed out that the driver would have acted correctly and asked to wait for the judicial investigation and the internal investigation that Renfe has opened to find out why the train reached that point.

For his part, the Minister of the Interior,

, who visited the area, assured that the priority should be the recovery of the wounded and confirmed that an investigation has been opened to clarify what happened.

Ciudadanos

has announced that it will ask the

about this railway incident.

According to the spokesperson for the

formation ,

, it is negligence and irresponsibility to allow a train to circulate with the entire mountain burning and demands to know when the decision was made to cut off railway traffic and if it was late.

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