Óscar Puente will appear this Tuesday, November 3, in Congress for the Urda railway accident, in Toledo, which has left at least 69 people dead. The appointment will come on the same day that the Council of Ministers plans to approve a package of aid for those affected.
The Minister of Transport and Sustainable Mobility will attend the Permanent Deputation, the only active body in the Lower House after the dissolution of the Cortes due to the early elections. He is expected to intervene around 5:00 p.m. to give explanations about the accident that occurred on October 28.
A decree with aid, advances and specific temporary disability
Pedro Sánchez announced this Monday that the decree will include economic aid that will double the amount of compulsory passenger insurance. It will also activate a specific mechanism to advance compensation.
The package will also incorporate specific temporary disability processes for the victims and the establishment of comprehensive and personalized care offices in the government delegations and sub-delegations in the autonomous communities of those affected.
Puente insists he will not resign while the investigation remains open
After the accident, Puente has already offered two press conferences and has reiterated that he is not considering resigning over what happened. In fact, he assured that he offered his position to the President of the Government, but that Sánchez rejected his departure, considering it "unfair".
Regarding the causes, the minister initially pointed to an "unexplained" order from the Adif Control Center as the main hypothesis. According to his explanation, from that center an AVE was authorized to circulate at normal speed despite the fact that on that same track there was an Iryo train stopped due to the failure of the LZB system, which, always according to Puente, would have failed up to 170 times this year.
The first investigations by the Independent Administrative Authority for the Technical Investigation of Railway, Maritime and Civil Aviation Accidents and Incidents place the collision between the two trains at an estimated speed of between 160 and 200 kilometers per hour. The minister's appearance and the approval of the decree will, for now, leave political explanations and the assistance response running in parallel.
