The mangled wreckage of an iron ore freight train that was deliberately derailed in Western Australia's north after it took off without its driver has been cleared from the tracks.
The nearly 3km-long runaway train hurtled along BHP's Newman to Port Hedland line for about 50 minutes early on Monday, leaving behind the driver, who had stepped out to inspect one of its 268 wagons.
The locomotive was derailed by staff at a remote control centre more than 1500km away in Perth, who diverted it to Turner's Siding, about 120km south of the populated port.
Nobody was injured but about 1.5km of track was damaged.
Chief executive Andrew Mackenzie praised their quick thinking, saying the train "could have caused a lot of damage" if it had continued on to Port Hedland.
He also said the company was planning investments in its railways and safety "before this accident happened".
A spokeswoman said on Friday the company was confident rail operations, which have been completely suspended since the derailment, would partially resume early next week.
The company continues to say it cannot speculate on the causes of the incident.
BHP revealed mid-week it did not have enough iron ore stockpiled at Port Hedland to cover its scheduled shipments, saying it would liaise with customers about its contractual commitments.
The BHP train was partly autonomous.
Rio Tinto made its first delivery of iron ore using a fully autonomous train in the Pilbara region in July, kicking off its $940 million AutoHaul program, which is expected to be complete by the end of the year.
It will be the world's first fully autonomous, long-distance, heavy-haul rail network, operating the world's largest and longest robots, Rio Tinto says.
