The Iryo train involved this Wednesday in the railway accident in Urda (Toledo) remained stopped because it was still not receiving instructions from the Adif control center in Atocha, while the Renfe train that was traveling behind it was authorized to continue the journey.
According to sources close to Iryo told Europa Press, the train driver was still in communication with the control center when the AVE from Renfe struck the rear of its consist.
The Minister of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Óscar Puente, already told journalists that the control center ordered some of the six trains —automatically stopped after the failure of the LZB safety system— to resume their journey normally, among them the AVE from Renfe.
However, Puente did not specify how many or which of those trains received the instruction to continue the trip. The Iryo train did not receive that indication and, consequently, remained stopped.
The head of Transport detailed that said order issued from the control center was carried out "in violation of the regulations", since the control center's own system marked in red that the section where the Iryo was located was listed as occupied.
In the event of estimating that the trains had to keep moving forward, the instruction should have been to travel at low speed, with a maximum of 40 kilometers per hour. In fact, some driver of those six trains conveyed to the control center that the order to resume the march did not comply with the current regulations.
The minister has described these actions at the control center as "inexplicable": "What has happened in the 17 minutes between the order is given for the Renfe AVE to depart and the collision, we do not know precisely. It is truly... well, I do not want to get into adjectives".