“At least 31 dead”: what we know after the collision between two trains in Spain

“At least 31 people” died Wednesday in the collision of two high-speed trains about 150 km south of Madrid, according to the government of Castilla-La Mancha. This accident occurs in the middle of the electoral campaign before the legislative elections on November 29 and less than a year after the tragic accident in Adamuz, in Andalusia, which left 46 dead during a collision between two high-speed trains, shocking all of Spain. Spanish television showed live images of the damaged trains, of which two carriages were clearly derailed.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez quickly said he was “dismayed by this serious accident”. According to a spokesperson for the Spanish emergency services contacted by AFP, the collision took place “at 8:54 a.m.” (7:54 a.m. GMT) between “two trains, one from (the private operator) Yrio and the other from (the national company) Renfe”, near the Urda station, in the Castile-La Mancha region.

Several fire brigades, three helicopters and two mobile intensive care units (UVI) are already on site. “Traffic is interrupted on the Madrid-Andalusia high-speed line due to a collision between two trains,” the public company responsible for managing the railway infrastructure, ADIF, indicated on X.

The head of government Pedro Sánchez canceled his participation in a summit on obesity scheduled for Wednesday morning in Madrid, according to his services, while the Socialist Party (PSOE), which he leads, announced the suspension of all campaign activities for the day. Emiliano García-Page, president of Castile-La Mancha, for his part announced that he would suspend his schedule and go to the scene of the accident, saying he was following the situation “with concern”.

The leader of the Popular Party (PP, right), Alberto Núñez Feijóo, also said he was “very concerned” about this new train accident. With 4,000 kilometers of railway tracks, the Spanish high-speed rail network is the second largest in the world, after that of China, and one of the prides of the country.

The Adamuz tragedy, which occurred on January 18, had revived debates in Spain on the maintenance of the railway network and on safety for passengers, in the second most visited country in the world each year. This accident, when a train from the private company Iryo derailed before hitting a Renfe train coming in the opposite direction, also sparked strong criticism from the right-wing and far-right opposition against the government of socialist Pedro Sánchez.