Several factors were involved, from equipment breakdown to poor phrasing of the safe working rules: the most important was that the interurban picked up too much speed and the driver was not able to see the rear of the Indian Pacific around a sharp curve in a deep cutting in time to avoid a collision.

[1] The Commission found that the accident occurred after a power failure disabled two consecutive automatic signals: due to their fail-safe design, both exhibited danger (red).

Among other factors, it found that: The seven people who died were in the front compartment of the first carriage of the interurban train.

[4] A third train, bound for Lithgow, only narrowly avoided colliding with the wreckage when signallers managed to warn the driver to stop just 60 seconds before it reached the crash site.

To avoid any reference and insensitivity to the victims, it was re-numbered DIM8020 and remained in service until it was withdrawn in 2005 following many problems.