Rail safety questioned after Spain suffers second fatal high-speed train crash in a year

At least 68 ​people died when a Spanish high-speed express slammed into a stationary train on Wednesday, with rescuers scouring mangled carriages for more bodies after Spain's second fatal rail crash this year and Europe's deadliest since 2013.

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said "all of Spain" was in mourning after the collision, which the transport minister said happened after a Renfe service was authorised to proceed despite an active red signal due to a stationary train ahead.

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Oscar Puente told reporters in Madrid ​that the red signal was issued ‌due to a computer communications failure, which automatically stopped traffic, but an erroneous decision was then taken to restart the Renfe train.

Sanchez said in a televised address from near ⁠the site south of Madrid that the "terrible tragedy" would be investigated and vowed to address any failures that came to light, adding that the causes of the two crashes appeared to be unrelated.

Read moreSpain to observe three days of mourning after scores killed in high-speed train collision

"If we need to further strengthen safety in order to rebuild confidence in our high-speed rail system, we will do so, ‌because what is unacceptable for a country like Spain is to suffer two high-speed rail accidents in the same year," Sanchez said.

Spain's opposition People's Party said it had ⁠cancelled all campaign events for the day, ahead of elections next month.

Trapped among seats 

At the scene in rural Castilla-La Mancha, ambulances, funeral home vans and helicopters assembled beside one of the trains on an elevated stretch of track, while twisted metal and wreckage lay scattered down an embankment where at least three carriages had plunged.

The head of the regional government, Emiliano García-Page, said the death toll ​had risen to 68, while rescuers searching for other victims as darkness fell did not know if other fatalities would be discovered once the carriages were moved.

Passengers, some ‌splattered with blood or bandaged, were evacuated along a nearby road after the crash, which Spain's health minister, Monica Garcia, said had injured 80 people, 15 of them very seriously. Salvador Arriza described the chaos in his carriage.

"I was very close to the door, but (other passengers) were breaking the windows to be able to get out. Some people practically couldn't move because they were trapped amongst the seats," said the 62-year-old.

Investigation under way 

The disaster, the deadliest train accident in Europe since a 2013 ‌derailment in Spain's Santiago de Compostela in which 80 people died, follows another fatal accident in January involving high-speed trains operated by the same companies on the same line, in which 46 people died.

In that collision, a train derailed and smashed into an oncoming train, prompting a debate over investment in railway maintenance.

Renfe said ​on Wednesday that after being authorised to continue its journey, its train had crashed into the Iryo train that had remained stationary "for reasons we don't know".

"The Renfe train continued on its way as instructed, and a collision occurred. The exact sequence of events, the traffic conditions and the circumstances of the impact will have to be established by the investigation," Renfe said in a statement.

Iryo, which said it had activated emergency ​protocols, and state-owned infrastructure operator Adif did not respond to requests for comment.

Passengers sent flying 

A Castilla-La Mancha government spokesperson said 147 people were on board the Iryo train and 397 on the Renfe service when the collision occurred ​at about 9am (0800 GMT), derailing two Iryo carriages.

Passenger Rafael Barcelo said he felt lucky as he had stepped away from his seat for a ​coffee, adding there had been at least eight victims from his carriage.

"We were having breakfast, drinking a coffee when we felt a very strong impact and we were sent flying," he said.

At a school in Urda where relatives had been directed, a woman who gave her name as Ana fought back tears as ​she said there was still no news of her husband, Pepe. His name was not among those identified, although police had found their dog, Trece.

Renfe said it had opened a special line for families of victims. The railway operator said it had suspended ticket sales on the Madrid-Andalusia high-speed corridor until December 13.

Maintenance spending 

A preliminary Civil Guard report in February pointed to defects in the track, rail or a weld between two sections of track as the leading theory behind January's accident, though investigators kept seven other possibilities open.

Spain's railway safety authority has reported that accidents, including derailments and collisions, increased from 45 in 2016 to 57 in 2024 and 69 last year.

A Reuters analysis of data from ⁠the Spanish competition authority showed some 25 million passengers used a high-speed train in Spain in the first half of 2026, a drop of around 14% compared with the same period last year.

Meanwhile, European Commission data shows Spain's maintenance investment in its roughly 4,000km (2,485 miles) ⁠of high-speed lines has lagged other large European ​countries.

Although Spain spent an average of about €1.5 billion a year on its high-speed network between 2018 and 2022, more than any other European country, most of that money went toward new construction. Only about 16% was earmarked for maintenance, renewals and upgrades.

Only recently did Spain open its rail network to private companies to compete against RENFE. The Italian-owned IRYO started operating in Spain in 2022.

A spokesperson for Spain’s train workers’ union, Joan Rodríguez, said increased traffic brought by privatization has put extra strain on rail infrastructure.

“We are not convinced that the liberalisation of the high-speed passenger rail service was matched by the necessary upkeep of the lines,” Rodríguez told TVE on Wednesday. “I am not saying it was a determining factor (in the crashes), but yes, the increase in use of the network is a factor to keep in mind.”