The Minister of Justice and the Interior, Gabriela Bravo, admitted in her appearance at the Permanent Council of Les Corts that the Emergency Coordination Center did not notify "neither Adif nor Renfe" of the progress of the Bejís fire that forced the paralysis of the circulation of a train before the virulent advance of the flames. An incident that resulted in several injuries among the fifty passengers and for which yesterday the opposition asked Bravo to assume responsibilities and "leave."
After the declarations the day before by the Minister of Transport, Raquel Sánchez, who pointed out precisely that the railway management entities did not receive any notification about the complicated evolution of the fire, Bravo (Minister of the PSPV) avoided contradicting that version of the socialist minister.
In fact, the Valencian Minister assumed "political responsibility" for what happened, but refused to resign and wanted to emphasize some issues to justify the action of the Valencian Administration and the technicians. With another nuance: "I have not come here to accuse anyone."
The head of the Interior of the Consell wanted to emphasize that "the Emergency Coordination Center could not communicate anything to Adif or Renfe because it received notification of any measure regarding the suspension of train circulation". Therefore, Bravo continued, "if no instruction is received in this regard, it is not a communication failure, you cannot communicate what does not exist," she argued.
In fact, the minister read from the rostrum a very "illustrative" preliminary report from the Castellón Provincial Firefighters Consortium to explain what happened in the hours that the medium-distance train that connects Valencia and Zaragoza and that left the capital at 4:23 p.m. Valenciana was affected. Bravo pointed out that the behavior of the fire was essential to understand what happened. This, together with the fact that firefighters were acting simultaneously on two other serious fires (Vall d'Ebo and Les Useres) complicated the battle against the fire.
The socialist leader, reading the firefighters' document, stressed that "on August 16 the fire had a changing behavior, but such a violent change in conditions was not foreseen." However, the report states, "by 3 p.m. the fire became extremely violent and erratic." There was, Bravo explained, a combination of factors that turned a conventional fire into a "fire storm."
The Minister explained that, in a period of three hours, the fire acquired "an enormous and anomalous severity" and grew six times larger from 600 to 3,700 affected hectares. That's when the train incident happened.
Despite this, the opposition gave him no respite. The PP deputy Miguel Barrachina indicated that the misfortune was not worse thanks to "the courage" of the driver who acted "alone" because no one gave him any instructions. "You will be able to distribute responsibilities among the members of your government for the management and prevention of the fires, but that of the train is yours. You must resign, do not make it long," said Barrachina.
And it is that the PP is clear after the statement yesterday in Congress by the Minister of Transport: "Moncloa has opened the exit door to Bravo for its management with the Bejís train".
For his part, the deputy of Ciudadanos Eduardo del Pozo, insisted that not having notified Adif was "authentic negligence: a very serious event that put the lives of 48 people at risk." One argued, which was also joined by the deputy spokesman for Vox, José María Llanos: "The emergency center, that is, you, are the ones who should have notified and did not, therefore, it is your sole responsibility."
For her part, in the socialist caucus, the PSPV deputy Rosa Peris used the newspaper library to discredit the PP in fire management, recalling that the PP Minister Serafin Castellano faces 20 years in prison for his participation in the fire cartel . And she even went further and assured that the only ones who have ever blamed a train driver was Francisco Camps' PP who blamed the driver for the very serious subway accident on July 3.
