The ex-boss of the SNCF was heard as a witness on Thursday, April 28, during the derailment trial in 2013, which left seven dead. The former leader disputes the judicial expertise and leans for the thesis of a “metallurgical defect” as the cause of the disaster.
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It was to a balancingist exercise that Guillaume Pepy gave himself, for four hours before the Evry Criminal Court (Essonne). Under the rolling fire of the lawyers of the civil parties, the ex-boss of the SNCF (2008-2019) was heard as witness, Thursday, April 28, on the fourth day of the trial of the railway accident in Brétigny-sur-Orge ( Essonne), which cost the life, in July 2013, to seven people and made several hundred injured.
Law like a “i”, a dark costume, the ex-63-year-old leader recognized, at the helm, “infinite moral responsibility” of the SNCF, judged until June 17, like SNCF Réseau and a local ex-leader, for “involuntary homicides” and “involuntary injuries”.
His notes posed on the desk, Mr. Pepy assures that he has no “personal opinion” on the “criminal responsibility” of the SNCF or on the “quality of work of this or that person on the Brétigny site” , on which he would not have received “any report or specific information” before the accident.
“easier to incriminate the equipment than men”
The chopped voice, the ex-Number 1 of the SNCF tells having visited the scene of the drama “in mototaxi”, on July 12, 2013, and having inspected the section at the origin of the derailment of the Paris train -Limoges at the speed of 137 km/hour. In front of the court, he regrets having declared immediately, “in full confusion”, that the disaster had been caused by a “maintenance problem”.
“I acquired the conviction, as the investigation progresses, that traceability was not well done in Brétigny, that the organization of maintenance was not optimal. But these are regrettable elements of context. These work defects do not replace a technical truth, the tree of robust and scientific causes “, he develops.
To explain this “unpublished accident in France in a hundred and fifty years of rail history”, Mr. Pepy is more leaning for the “thesis” supported by the experts mandated by the SNCF. Namely a “metallurgical default damage” likely to be at the origin of “turning and disassembly of the hatch”, this metal part which ensures the junction between two rails.
Unlike judicial experts, who mentioned maintenance failures, Mr. Pepy gives credit to the “alternative scenario” built by engineers “remunerated” by the SNCF.
“Seven of the largest rail engineers mandated by the SNCF, saphants who have no reason to lie, do not believe in the kinetics of the proposed track, the thesis of a lack of Interview and surveillance, he argues. Especially since surveillance was carried out under conditions discussed by a young competent professional, that this track device was not lost in the bush, was visited by national technical experts, and had been the subject of exams. “
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