Spain began three days of mourning on Thursday for at least 69 people who died in a high-speed rail collision, as hospitals continued to treat dozens of injured passengers and train drivers went on strike to urge more investment in railway safety.
The trains – one from Spain’s state-owned Renfe and the other from the private rail company Iryo – were travelling from Madrid towards the southern region of Andalucía on Wednesday when they collided just before 9am. After the Iryo train came to a halt, the other slammed into its rear, knocking several carriages off the track near Urda in the central region of Castilla-La Mancha.
Spain’s foreign ministry said 42 foreign citizens from seven countries were involved in the crash, adding that one had been killed and at least seven injured.
The crash came 10 months after 46 people were killed and dozens more injured when two trains – one from Renfe and one from Iryo – collided on the same line near the town of Adamuz in Andalucía.
The disaster has raised fresh questions about safety on Spain’s large, modern high-speed rail network. The transport minister, Óscar Puente, said rear-end collisions such as Wednesday’s were “highly unlikely”, and suggested the accident could have been caused by human error under “inexplicable” circumstances.
Emergency services combed the wreckage through the night for more victims, using cranes to hoist pieces of mangled metal. At daybreak, police once again launched drones to survey the crash site.
Emiliano García-Page, the leader of the Castilla-La Mancha regional government, said on Thursday morning that rescue teams did not think they would find any more bodies in one damaged carriage that was still overturned, but added that body parts had been found that would need to be identified.
“Yesterday we experienced a catastrophe that without a doubt has left all of Spain in shock,” said García-Page. He confirmed that 50 of the people who had been taken to hospitals in the region were still being treated.
The prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, speaking during a visit to the emergency command centre in the city of Toledo, said the authorities were doing all they could to establish the cause of the crash and prevent another rail tragedy.
“I’d like to let all Spaniards know that every institution that is part of the state – from the smallest municipality to the government of Spain – is working day and night, not only to provide a response to the families of the victims, but also, of course, to uncover every last detail of this tragedy and to strengthen safety measures so that something like this never happens again.”
King Felipe, who visited a hospital in Toledo where some of the injured were being treated, said Spain had “once again suffered an extremely harsh blow” and called for lessons to be learned.
“There is obviously an ongoing investigation, which should establish how and why this tragedy happened,” he said on Thursday. “Measures will need to be looked at and adopted so that this doesn’t happen again.”
Meanwhile, Spanish train drivers went ahead with a previously planned strike to press for more investment in railway safety. The crash was Europe’s deadliest train accident since a derailment in Santiago de Compostela in north-west Spain that killed 80 people in 2013.
“We will continue demanding the necessary measures to make this sector safe again … It must have all the safety systems required to maintain the quality standards we have always had,” said Diego Martín of the train drivers’ union Semaf. “We cannot tolerate, under any circumstances, this type of incident happening again.”
The Guardia Civil police force has set up four offices in the cities of Madrid, Toledo, Córdoba and Seville to enable relatives to provide DNA samples and help identify victims. Blood donation points have also been set up in Castilla-La Mancha and Madrid. The force said 64 people had been reported missing by relatives by Thursday morning.
A school in Urda, which lies about 130km (80 miles) south of Madrid, has been turned into an information centre where relatives can inquire about loved ones. Teams of Red Cross workers offered support to groups of people who had arrived, some of them in tears.
Carmen García, a Red Cross psychologist, said “long and hard hours” lay ahead and that “every person will manage it in their own way”. She added: “We have people who are in shock, who haven’t taken on board what has happened, angry people, sad, worried people. The grieving will be complicated.”
José Miguel Fernández, a parish priest in Urda, joined the emergency services in offering support to the victims’ families.
“It is important for relatives to find their loved ones, even if they have died, because the grieving process is quicker when you have been able to say goodbye at that final moment,” he told Onda Cero radio.
Survivors have spoken of being thrown from their seats by the impact of the crash, and of trying to help the injured in the immediate aftermath.
Among the first victims to be named was José Manuel Chacón, a 31-year-old Guardia Civil officer. The national law enforcement agency expressed its “deepest condolences” to his family, friends and colleagues.
Also among those killed was Fátima Báñez, a former labour minister for the conservative People’s party (PP), who had gone on to chair the social and corporate responsibility arm of Spain’s employers’ association.
The PP leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, called for an immediate investigation into what had happened, as well as a “complete and independent review” of Spain’s entire rail network. “Spain has the right to know what is going on with its infrastructure,” he told reporters.
With Agence France-Presse and Reuters
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: theguardian.com
