Friends of the Rail Forum

Two people have been killed after a high-speed train derailed near the northern Italian city of Lodi, emergency services say. Both of the dead are thought to be drivers. At least one person, a cleaner on the train, had significant but not life-threatening injuries. The train was travelling from Milan to the southern city of Salerno...

The train left the tracks some 40km (25 miles) from Milan at around 05:30 local time (04:30 GMT), the railway company said. The causes of the accident are being investigated.

The dynamics of the derailment - The engine of the convoy, after being sidetracked from the tracks, would have completely left the seat, ending up first against a trolley or some similar vehicle that was on a parallel track, and then against a railway building, where it finished the his run. The rest of the convoy, on the other hand, would have continued the race again with the second carriage which at some point would have overturned. The train is located just under a kilometer from where it is derailed. According to the prosecutor: " We cannot say how long it will take to restore the line, it will probably take at least two days if not more to clear the section "

The hypothesis under consideration - " We are testing the hypothesis of human error ". This is what the Prosecutor of the Republic of Lodi Domenico Chiaro said, not specifying whether staff involved in the high-speed accident have already been heard. The train - he reported - is "derailed at the height of an exchange that had to be placed in a certain position and it was not so ". One of the causes of the Frecciarossa derailment could have been a problem with an exchange where yesterday a 'turnout' would have been replaced, that is a piece of the exchange itself. "I exclude any reference to a voluntary activity, the attack hypothesis is without foundation," said the Prosecutor. "we are trying to understand what activities have been carried out and what kind of connection there is between this activity and the occurrence of the disaster. This is one of the hypotheses, we test them all. "Clearly he specified that" the exchange would seem to have some connection with the occurrence of the fact "." The maintenance works are done because something broke , otherwise there is no reason to be there at 4:30 in the morning, "he observed." If the exchange had been straight for straight - he added - the train would not have been derailed, it is not difficult to understand. It was not in the position that was to guarantee the free travel of the train"Clearly he specified that" it was a part of the exchange involved in the maintenance works "." The companies involved have already launched a commission of inquiry and are giving maximum availability to the competent bodies to collaborate "...

According to local media, initial investigations suggested that a facing turnout leading from the southbound high speed track into sidings used as an infrastructure maintenance base had been incorrectly set. One report added that this had not been detected by the train control system as the power supply to the turnout had been disconnected.

Track maintenance work had been taking place in the area overnight, and investigators will no doubt examine both the work carried out and the details of communications between maintenance staff and the line control centre in preparation for reopening the line.

A key consideration for both the investigators and the rail sector as a whole must be how the ETCS Level 2 used on the line could somehow issue a movement authority for AV9595 to proceed at full speed without proper confirmation that all turnouts along the route were correctly set, locked and detected.