Spanish police said Monday that no less than 39 persons are confirmed dead in a high-speed rail collision the previous night within the south of the country when the tail end of a train jumped the track, causing one other train speeding past in the other way to derail.
The impact tossed the second train’s lead carriages off the track, sending them plummeting down a 4-meter (13-foot) slope. Some bodies were found tons of of meters (feet) from the crash site, Andalusia regional president Juanma Moreno said, describing the wreckage a “mass of twisted metal” with bodies likely still to be found inside.
Efforts to get well the bodies continued Monday, and the death toll is more likely to rise. Authorities are also specializing in attending tons of of distraught members of the family and have asked for them to offer DNA samples to assist in the identification of the victims.
The crash occurred Sunday at 7:45 p.m. when the tail end of a train carrying 289 passengers on the route from Malaga to the capital, Madrid, went off the rails. It slammed into an incoming train traveling from Madrid to Huelva, one other southern Spanish city, in response to rail operator Adif.
The top of the second train, which was carrying nearly 200 passengers, took the brunt of the impact, Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente said. That collision knocked its first two carriages off the track. Puente said that it appeared the biggest variety of the deaths occurred in those carriages.
Authorities said all of the survivors had been rescued within the early morning.
Moreno said Monday morning that emergency services were still trying to find bodies.
“It is probably going (that there can be more dead people found) whenever you have a look at the mass of metal that’s there. The firefighters have done a terrific job, but unfortunately once they get the heavy machinery to lift the carriages it’s probable we are going to find more victims.”
“Here at ground zero, whenever you have a look at this mass of twisted iron, you see the violence of the impact,” Moreno said.
Moreno said that authorities are also searching the world near the accident for possible bodies.
“The impact was so incredibly violent that we’ve got found bodies tons of of meters away,” Moreno said.
Various Spaniards who had family members traveling on the trains posted messages on social media saying they were unaccounted for and pleading for any information.
Spain’s Civil Guard opened an office in Cordoba, the closest city to the crash, in addition to Madrid, Malaga, Huelva and Seville for members of the family of the missing to hunt help and leave DNA samples.
Get day by day National news
Get the day’s top news, political, economic, and current affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox once a day.
“A few of the dead will not be easily identifiable and can need a DNA test,” Moreno said.
Video and photos showed twisted train cars lying on their sides under floodlights late on Sunday.
“The carriages were twisted. We needed to work slowly, cutting through the wreckage,” Francisco Carmona, firefighter chief of Cordoba, told Onda Cero radio. “There have been moments after we needed to remove the dead to get to the living.”
Passengers reported climbing out of smashed windows, with some using emergency hammers to interrupt the glass, in response to Salvador Jiménez, a journalist for Spanish broadcaster RTVE, who was on board one in all the derailed trains.
Jiménez didn’t suffer serious injuries, but saw bodies being pulled out of train cars, calling the image “harrowing.”
“A train can derail or have an accident,” Jiménez told the network by phone Monday, “but this magnitude of tragedy was unthinkable.”
Authorities said 159 people were injured. As of Monday, that included 11 adults and one child in critical condition.
‘Images that may stay in my mind’
The collision took place near Adamuz, a town within the province of Cordoba, about 370 kilometers (about 230 miles) south of Madrid.
A sports center in Adamuz was became a makeshift hospital, and the Spanish Red Cross arrange a help center offering assistance to emergency services and other people in search of information. Members of the Civil Guard and civil defense worked on site throughout the night.
“The scene was horrific. It was terrible,” Adamuz mayor Rafael Moreno told The Associated Press and other reporters. “People asking and begging for help. Those leaving the wreckage. Images that may at all times stay in my mind.”
Spanish King Felipe VI expressed his condolences Monday, adding that the royal house was looking right into a visit to Adamuz in the approaching days.
“I understand the desperation of the families and the variety of injured individuals who have suffered this accident, and we’re all really anxious,” he said, speaking from Athens.
The Spanish flag was flown at half-mast in front of Parliament in Madrid for the victims on Monday.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez will visit the accident site on Monday, in response to his office.
Officials call accident ‘strange’
Transport Minister Puente early Monday said the reason behind the crash was unknown.
He called it “a very strange” incident since it happened on a flat stretch of track that had been renovated in May. He also said the train that jumped the track was lower than 4 years old. That train belonged to the Italian-owned company Iryo, while the second train, which took the brunt of the impact, was a part of Spain’s public train company, Renfe.
In accordance with Puente, the back a part of the primary train derailed and crashed into the pinnacle of the opposite train. When asked by reporters how long an inquiry into the crash’s cause could take, he said it may very well be a month.
Álvaro Fernández, the president of Renfe, told Spanish public radio RNE that each trains were well under the speed limit of 250 kph (155 mph); he said one was going 205 kph (127 mph), the opposite 210 kph (130 mph). He also said that “human error may very well be ruled out.”
The incident “should be related to the moving equipment of Iryo or the infrastructure” the Renfe president said.
Iryo issued an announcement on Monday saying that its train was manufactured in 2022 and passed its latest safety check on Jan. 15. It reiterated its condolences for the victims and said it could completely cooperate with the official investigation into the causes of the tragedy.
Train services Monday between Madrid and cities in Andalusia were canceled.
Spain leads Europe in high-speed trains
Spain has spent many years investing heavily in high-speed trains and currently has the biggest rail network in Europe for trains moving over 250 kph (155 mph), with greater than 3,100 kilometers (1,900 miles) of track, in response to the European Union.
The network is a well-liked, competitively priced and protected mode of transport. Renfe said greater than 25 million passengers took one in all its high-speed trains in 2024.
Sunday’s accident was the primary with deaths on a high-speed train since Spain’s high-speed rail network opened its first line in 1992.
Spain’s worst train accident this century occurred in 2013, when 80 people died after a train derailed within the country’s northwest. An investigation concluded the train was traveling 179 kph (111 mph) on a stretch with an 80 kph (50 mph) speed limit when it left the tracks. That stretch of track was not high speed.