{"id":423853,"date":"2026-01-19T19:33:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-19T19:33:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/423853\/"},"modified":"2026-01-19T19:33:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T19:33:17","slug":"what-we-know-so-far-about-spains-fatal-high-speed-train-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/423853\/","title":{"rendered":"What we know so far about Spain’s fatal high-speed train crash"},"content":{"rendered":"

Emergency crews in Spain continue to search the wreckage of two trains after a high-speed rail crash which killed 40 people and left 12 in intensive care.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The tragedy, near Adamuz in C\u00f3rdoba province on Sunday night, unfolded when one train, travelling northbound from M\u00e1laga to Madrid, derailed and was hit by another high-speed service travelling in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez has called the disaster \u201ca night of deep pain for our country\u201d and on Monday declared a three-day mourning period.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, a probe has been launched into what caused a “practically new” train to derail and investigators have begun focusing on a rail joint along the track.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Here’s everything we know so far.<\/p>\n

Train derailed before collision<\/p>\n

The tragedy happened along a remote section of high-speed rail line linking the Spanish capital Madrid with the southern city of Malaga.<\/p>\n

There were around 400 passengers on board the two trains, according to statements by the two operators of the trains, Iryo and state-run Renfe’s Alvia.<\/p>\n

The incident began when the Iryo train, travelling northbound at 110 kilometres per hour, derailed.<\/p>\n

Twenty seconds later, the second train, travelling southbound at 200 kilometres per hour, either collided with the final two carriages of the Iryo train or with debris on the line, according to Renfe President \u00c1lvaro Fernandez Heredia.<\/p>\n

Ana, a young woman travelling back to Madrid who was being treated at a Red Cross centre in Adamuz, described the moment the crash unfolded.<\/p>\n

“The train tipped to one side \u2026 then everything went dark, and all I heard was screams,” she said.\"Multiple<\/p>\n

Authorities believe the tragedy was caused by one train derailing into the path of the second oncoming train. (Reuters\/Guardia Civil)<\/p>\n

Police drone footage showed how the trains had come to a standstill 500 metres apart. The carriage of one train had been split in two, with one part crushed like a tin can.<\/p>\n

Remote location complicates rescue mission<\/p>\n

The crash is the worst train tragedy in Spain since 2013, when 80 people were killed as a high-speed train veered off a curved section of track outside the north-western city of Santiago de Compostela.<\/p>\n

The interior ministry said 40 people died in Sunday’s disaster.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the head of the regional government of Andalucia, Juan Manuel Moreno, said he expected that figure could rise.<\/p>\n

“Unfortunately, it is quite possible that additional victims will be found beneath the twisted wreckage,” he said.<\/p>\n

“The goal is to identify the victims as quickly as possible.”<\/p>\n

Loading…<\/p>\n

Over 120 people were injured<\/a>, with 43 still in hospital, regional emergency services said. Of those, 12 were in intensive care.<\/p>\n

The remote location of the crash, in a hilly, olive-growing region, has complicated the rescue operation.<\/p>\n

The site can only be accessed by a single-track road, making it difficult for ambulances to enter and exit, I\u00f1igo Vila, national emergency director at the Spanish Red Cross, told Reuters.<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/p>\n

The two trains collided on Sunday evening along a straight section of recently renovated track. (Reuters: Susana Vera)<\/p>\n

‘A day of sorrow’ for Spain<\/p>\n

Speaking on Monday, local time, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez promised authorities would get to the bottom of what caused the high-speed train crash.<\/p>\n

“We will uncover the answer, and once the cause of this tragedy is determined, we will present it with absolute transparency,” he told reporters in the southern town of Adamuz near where the disaster happened.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is vowing to make public the findings of any investigation. (Reuters: Ana Beltran)<\/p>\n

He also declared that Spain would mark three days of mourning following the tragedy.<\/p>\n

“This is a day of sorrow for all of Spain, for our entire country,” he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Minister says crash ‘extremely strange’<\/p>\n

Spain has the largest high-speed rail network in Europe and the second largest in the world after China, with 3,622 kilometres of track.<\/p>\n

Spanish Transport Minister Oscar Puente said the first train to derail was “practically new” and the section of the track where the disaster happened had been recently renovated.<\/p>\n

\"People<\/p>\n

People affected by a deadly train derailment were transferred and treated at the Caseta Municipal in the town of Adamuz.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 (Reuters: Alex Gallegos)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe accident is extremely strange,’ he said. “It happened on a straight stretch of track.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“All the railway experts who have been here today at this centre and those we have been able to consult are extremely surprised by the accident because, as I say, it is strange, very strange.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“It is very difficult to explain at this point.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Initial inspection finds broken rail joint<\/p>\n

According to a report by Reuters, however, investigators are already focusing on a broken rail joint discovered on the track at the crash site.<\/p>\n

The news agency, citing a source briefed on initial investigations into the disaster, said technicians analysing the rails had identified some wear on a joint between sections of the rail, known as a fishplate.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was claimed that a fault on the joint had been there for some time and created a gap between rail sections which had widened as trains continued to travel on the track.<\/p>\n

The source, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the issue, said the technicians believe the faulty joint is key to identifying the precise cause of the accident.<\/p>\n

The first carriages of the train operated by Spanish firm Iryo drove over the gap in the rails, but the eighth, and last, carriage derailed, bringing with it the seventh and sixth carriages, the source told the agency.<\/p>\n

Neither Spain’s rail accident investigator nor the country’s rail operator Adif responded to Reuters’s requests for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Reuters\/AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Emergency crews in Spain continue to search the wreckage of two trains after a high-speed rail crash which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":423854,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[28222,1154,10851,43,26091,57596,5315,44,7452,2020,41,39,42,40,106857,40661,222812],"class_list":["post-423853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-accident","tag-crash","tag-dead","tag-headlines","tag-high-speed","tag-injured","tag-investigation","tag-news","tag-search","tag-spain","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-train","tag-victims","tag-wreckage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=423853"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423853\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/423854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=423853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=423853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=423853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}