Did someone tamper with the signaling “logic” in the system that led to the failure of the point?
This is the direction in which the probe has started to look after evaluating all available data on the ground, sources connected to the exercise said the indian express.
Minister of Railways Ashwini Vaisnaw Sunday indicated human involvement in the one of the worst train accidents in history which claimed at least 288 lives since Friday.
“The root cause has been identified. And the people who have done it have also been identified, ”he said Saturday at the scene of the accident. Vaishnaw said the report from the Commissioner of Railway Safety (CRS) will be made public soon.
“For what reason did this incident happen, the information of which will soon be in front of you?”, he told DD News.
When asked if there were anti-social elements involved in this, Vaishnaw said that saying anything now would not be right.
“Saying something about that at this time would be possible but not appropriate before the CRS investigation report,” he said.
Vaishnaw said that whoever has done it has changed the configuration of the marking (point) on the track and that this was not a matter of anti-collision device. “Whoever did it has made such a change to the point machine…the track configuration has been changed, which allows everything to work together, and that’s why the accident happened,” he said. “But I will say everything after the CRS report comes out.”
In something of a mystery, senior officials connected with the exercise have deduced that, unless modified, the core logic of the signaling system would ideally not allow an isolated signal to turn green for a line while at the same time the ” physical point” on the track directs the train to another line.
Checks and balances are hard-coded into the logic of the signaling system that errs on the side of caution, they said.
“In order for that signal to turn green and clear a path for the incoming train, multiple feeds, and not just one signal, would have to match to indicate all was well. Any deviation from this would only result in the signal turning red as the default failsafe mechanism,” one of the main sources said.