OTHER RAIL ACCIDENTS IN EUROPE
December 1988 - Thirty-five people die in a crash involving three trains at Clapham Junction in London. Slack safety measures are blamed.
October 1999 - Two trains collide near London's Paddington station, killing 31 people. One of the trains had gone through a red signal.
November 2000 - A fire in a tunnel in Austria engulfs a funicular train packed with skiers, killing 155 people.
May 2003 - Thirty-four people are killed in Hungary when the Budapest-Nagykanizsa train hits a coach full of mainly elderly German holidaymakers at a level crossing near Siofok.
June 2003 - A Spain passenger train travelling to Cartagena from Madrid crashes into the path of an oncoming goods train at Chinchilla, killing 19.
January 2005 - Seventeen people are killed when a passenger train and a freight train crash north of Bologna, Italy.
January 2006 - Up to 46 people are killed and 198 injured when a packed Montenegro train derails and plunges into a ravine outside the capital Podgorica.
July 2006 - Forty-one people are killed when an underground train derails and overturns in a Spain tunnel just before entering the Jesus metro station in Valencia.
June 2009 - An explosion on a passing freight train sets fire to nearby homes and burns families while they sleep in the seaside town of Viareggio, Italy, killing around 22 people.
February 2010 - Two trains crash head-on in snowy conditions at the village of Buizingen, near Halle, southwest of Brussels, Belgium, killing 18 people.
March 2012 - Two passenger trains derail in a head-on collision near Szczekociny, Poland. Sixteen people die and 58 are injured.
A passenger train derailed on a high-speed stretch of track in northwestern Spain on Wednesday night, causing one of the worst rail accidents in Europe over the past 25 years, officials said. Estimates of the dead ranged from 35 to more than 50 and at least 70 more were reported injured.
Officials gave different death tolls in the immediate aftermath of the accident. Alberto Nunez Feijoo, president of the region of Galicia, said at least 35 people aboard the train were killed, and added, “The scene is shocking, it’s Dante-esque.”
Spain’s leading Cadena SER radio station cited the president of the Galicia’s main court, Miguel Angel Cadenas, at the scene saying 56 people were killed, but that could not be independently confirmed. The station said three carriages had still to be inspected by rescue workers.
State-owned train operator Renfe said in a statement that 218 passengers and an unspecified number of staff were on board at the time of the accident. Renfe, which did not give a death or injury toll, said the derailment happened at 8.41 p.m. along a section of rail that had been inaugurated just two years ago.
All 13 cars derailed in a curve approaching the Santiago de Compostela station. The government said it was approaching the investigation intially as an accident.
Television footage Wednesday showed one wagon pointing upwards into the air with one of its ends twisted and disfigured. Another carriage that had been severed in two could be seen lying on a road near the track.
Witnesses reported a rear engine fire and one of the train’s cars was hurled about 15 feet up a hillside. Train cars that were ripped open or crashed on top of each other were scattered about on the rails.
“It was going so quickly … It seems that on a curve the train started to twist, and the wagons piled up one on top of the other,” passenger Ricardo Montesco told Cadena Ser radio station.
“A lot of people were squashed on the bottom. We tried to squeeze out of the bottom of the wagons to get out and we realized the train was burning … I was in the second wagon and there was fire … I saw corpses,” he added.
Many passengers on the train were pilgrims bound for Feast day festivities planned in the city of Santiago de Compostela. The city cancelled the event in light of the tragedy, town hall spokeswoman Maria Pardo told Spanish National television TVE.
Rescuers struggled to pull victims out of the windows. Bodies covered with blankets lay on the rails.
The train was headed northwest to El Ferrol from Madrid, and the accident occurred along a stretch of track near the train station in Santiago de Compostola, 60 miles south of El Ferrol. Rescue workers were seen in the television images caring for people still inside some of the wagons.
Officials at the Interior Ministry and the Adif rail infrastructure authority did not immediately answer telephone calls or return messages seeking comment. Officials with Renfe also did not immediately return messages seeking comment.
The accident was the first affecting Spain’s high-speed rail network called AVE, which operates at speeds as high as 193 mph. The Interior Ministry excluded an attack as the cause of the accident.
King Juan Carlos and Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, a native of Galicia, both offered their condolences. Rajoy announced he would visit the site Thursday.
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