At least 40 dead in Spain after two high-speed trains collide

By Nina Lopez and Michael Francis Gore

ADAMUZ, Spain, Jan 19 (Reuters) – At least 40 people have died in southern Spain after a high-speed train derailed and collided with an oncoming one on Sunday night in one of the worst railway accidents in Europe in 80 years.

Twelve were in intensive care after the accident near Adamuz in the province of Cordoba, about 360 km (223 miles) south of Madrid, according to emergency services. Experts say a faulty rail joint might be key to determining the cause of the crash.

“The train tipped to one side… then everything went dark, and all I heard was screams,” said Ana Garcia Aranda, 26, who was being treated at a Red Cross centre in Adamuz.

Limping and with plasters across her face, she described how fellow passengers dragged her out of the train covered in blood. Firefighters rescued her pregnant sister from the wreckage and an ambulance took them both to hospital. 

“There were people who were fine and others who were very, very badly injured… you knew they were going to die, and you couldn’t do anything,” she said.

REMOTE LOCATION COMPLICATES RESCUE

The collision occurred in a hilly, olive-growing region accessible only by a single-track road, making it difficult for ambulances to reach the area, Iñigo Vila, national emergency director at the Spanish Red Cross, told Reuters.

The Andalusia region’s President Juan Manuel Moreno said at least 40 people had perished, and emergency crews faced difficulties bringing in the heavy equipment needed to lift the wreckage and reach those still lying beneath it.

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez cancelled his trip to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and Transport Minister Oscar Puente visited the site on Monday.

Police drone footage showed how the trains came to a standstill 500 metres apart. One train’s carriage was split in two, and the locomotive was crushed like a tin can.

Experts studying the crash site found a broken joint on the rails, which created a gap between the rail sections that widened as trains continued to travel on the track, according to a source briefed on initial investigations.

That faulty joint could prove important in identifying the cause of the accident, the source said.

‘INTERACTION BETWEEN THE TRACK AND THE VEHICLE’

Ignacio Barron, head of Spain’s Commission of Investigation of Rail Accidents (CIAF), said on RTVE: “What always plays a part in a derailment is the interaction between the track and the vehicle, and that is what the commission is currently (looking into).”

Paqui, an Adamuz resident who rushed to help rescue survivors with her husband, said he had “found a dead child inside, another child calling for his mother. You’re never ready to see something like this.”

Police said they had opened an office in Cordoba for relatives to provide DNA samples to help identify the dead.

The Iryo train was travelling at 110 kph from Malaga to Madrid when it derailed, Renfe President Álvaro Fernandez Heredia said on radio station Cadena Ser.

Twenty seconds later, the second train, heading to Huelva at 200 kph, either collided with the final two carriages of the Iryo train or with debris on the line, he said. The Iryo train lost a wheel that has not yet been located. 

CRASH OCCURRED IN ‘STRANGE CONDITIONS’

It was too early to talk about the cause, but it happened in “strange conditions,” Fernandez Heredia said, adding that human error was virtually ruled out.

The death toll was among the top 20 highest from a train crash in Europe in 80 years, according to Eurostat data, and the highest in Spain since 2013, when a train derailed in the northwestern city of Santiago de Compostela, killing 80.

Spanish train drivers had warned state-owned rail infrastructure administrator Adif of “severe wear and tear” on the Madrid-Andalusia line and others, according to a letter seen by Reuters sent to Adif by train drivers union Semaf in August and urging stricter speed restrictions.

Adif had no immediate comment.

The Iryo train, a Frecciarossa 1000, was under four years old and the railway line near Adamuz was renovated last May, Puente said. Iryo said the train was last inspected on January 15.

Spain’s high-speed railway network is the largest in Europe and second-largest in the world after China with 3,622 km of tracks, according to Adif.

The government was criticised last year for a series of delays to high-speed rail, caused by power outages and the theft of copper cables from the lines. 

  Spain opened up the network to private competition in 2020 in a bid to offer low-cost alternatives to Renfe’s Ave trains. 

Iryo is a joint venture between Italian state railway operator Ferrovie dello Stato, airline Air Nostrum and Spanish infrastructure investment fund Globalvia.  

($1 = 0.8604 euros)

(Reporting by Nina Lopez, Michael Gore, Leonardo Benassatto, Susana Vera, Emma Pinedo and Victoria Waldersee; additional reporting by Pietro Lombardi and Jesus Aguado; Writing by Charlie Devereux; Editing by David Latona, Sharon Singleton and Bernadette Baum)