Behind the Spanish train crash of last week, which took the lives of 79 people, is a tale of negligence that does not fail to terrify even the most hardened onlooker.
After a few days, and some wrangling, the conductor of the train has been released on bond, as he awaits hearing his indictment, which promises to be stiff. 79 counts of negligent manslaughter at last count.
But from the beginning, the conductor has somehow seemed clueless as to the gravity of his actions. Now there are news that he was on the phone, as his train sped at more than twice the rate permitted and only tried to correct the train a few seconds before impact, and the latter too is now in doubt.
In an eery reminiscence of the Costa Concordia accident, in which woeful negligence resulted in the death of 30 people and an environmental disaster, the conductor of the Spanish train seems to be in some way almost detached, alien, to the massacre he caused.
Just like Schettino, the captain of the C. Concordia, there is a sense that neither of these people, the conductor nor the captain, wants or is able to take responsibility for his actions. Are human lives so cheap anymore, that a man responsible for their death through some foolish action cannot even take a measure of his deeds?
But that is so. Today the conductor said that he 'doesn't understand' how he crashed. There is very little to understand actually. Speed and carelessness, a train careening out of control while the conductor chats on the phone, a man who took his job so lightly that he boasted for months on his facebook wall how fast he could take the train.
It seems that people live in some alternate reality. There is very little sense of what can happen. A boast on facebook is worth more than 79 lives. Similarly, a salute to a friend on the island of Giglio caused 30 deaths and a ruinous outcome for the island. Undeterred, a Carnival cruise liner captain, a ship of immense proportions, came at elbow's distance of the Piazza San Marco just last week, and risked a tragedy and disaster of immense scope had he missed, just to tip his hat at one of Carnival's main stockholders whose yatch was lolling in the waters off of Venice. Had the Carnival cruise missed, treasured untold could have been destroyed, the values of which could not even be repaid by the sum total of Carnival's holdings.
There is a sense that dignity and responsibility is dead. These men do not even have the dignity to take responsibility of their actions. They hide behind the cloud of dynamics and investigations, trying to claim that the hand of fate, or some unknown mechanism behind the horrible outcomes, had their hand in the disasters.
In fact, the train conductor even tries to claim that some mechanism he tried to activate at the last moment failed to stop the train. That's utter nonsense. The movie shows a train careening at a ruinous rate of speed, unabated, unhinged, and uncontrolled.
What the corporations, states, agencies, or any other entities must do then, is to evaluate people who have the lives of others in their hands, and see that they are examined for their fitness to serve in their capacities as drivers, conductors, captains and so on.
Without it, disasters like the train crash in Spain and the Costa Concordia will become more and more frequent.
Op-Ed
Partial Source : France 24/ 8.1.13
No comments:
Post a Comment