The fire that has been well and truly lit in the Greek railways by the sequence of incidents that constitute a ticking time bomb for public safety, is thrown by yesterday’s revelation of the short circuit between the suburban railway and the metro line, which almost caused another serious incident in the railway network with unforeseen consequences.

With the deafening silence that the transport operators tried to cover the incident once again and the working engineers revealed, the railway is now proving to be the weakest link in the public transport system, where understaffing, indifference and lack of training pose serious risks for the travelling public.

Unfortunately for all of us, the big gap in the trains, which was shown in a very painful way by the tragedy in Tempe, remains open and is constantly growing, revealing weaknesses, dangerous omissions and failures that miraculously have not led to new tragedies.

The scope of the errors proves that we have learned little from our bad past with rail operators and the civil service continuing to give the impression of an unwinding clock.