At least 68 killed as two trains collide near Urda

The crash happened at 8.53am on Wednesday 28 October at kilometre 118 of the Madrid-Seville high-speed line, near Urda station in Toledo province. A Renfe AVE train travelling from Madrid to Seville hit a stationary Iryo train from behind on the same track. The impact derailed several carriages and two of them fell down an embankment. It is Spain's second fatal high-speed crash this year and the worst since the Santiago de Compostela derailment in 2013. In January, a collision in Adamuz, Córdoba province, killed 46 people.

What happened

According to Transport Minister Óscar Puente, the LZB signalling system — which provides full safety guarantees on the Madrid-Seville line — stopped working at around 8.30am because of a communication failure between computers. The affected stretch, about 63 kilometres long, lost the system and trains running on it stopped automatically. There were at least six, including the Renfe AVE and the Iryo train that later collided.

Six minutes later, the Adif control centre in Atocha, which had taken manual control, authorised the AVE to resume "normally" even though the Iryo was still stopped further ahead and a red signal was showing, according to Puente. The AVE covered about 25 kilometres before reaching the other train at 8.53am. The minister called the order "inexplicable" and "unbelievable" and said the drivers were not to blame. Investigators must establish exactly what instruction the driver received and why the train was running at normal speed on a stretch where trains can reach 200 km/h in normal conditions.

The Renfe train, service 2080, had left Atocha at 8am for Seville with 397 passengers. The Iryo train, service 6076, had left at 7.54am with 147 people, including a baby. In total, 544 people were on board. The Castilla-La Mancha government has confirmed 68 deaths: 24 on the AVE and 44 on the Iryo. The figure is provisional and the authorities have not ruled out that it may rise as the wreckage is removed.

The emergency services treated more than 180 people. About 50 injured people remained in hospital in Castilla-La Mancha and 76 were treated in Madrid, according to balances on Wednesday night and Thursday morning; about 20 were in intensive care. Hospitals in Toledo, Ciudad Real, Alcázar de San Juan and Madrid suspended planned surgery and Madrid's blood transfusion centre appealed for urgent donations.

The investigation

The Guardia Civil questioned the Adif control centre operator who authorised the restart. Alcohol and drug tests were negative, according to sources cited by El País. The investigating court in Orgaz, Toledo province, has sealed the case and ordered initial inquiries, including the traffic protocols and the two trains' black boxes. The Independent Administrative Authority for Technical Accident Investigation (AITAT), which replaced the old rail accident commission this year, has sent three investigators to the site and says it is too early to advance hypotheses until it has verified data.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez declared three days of official mourning and promised that the investigation would "get to the bottom of this": "If there has been any negligence, it will come to light." King Felipe VI expressed his condolences. The main parties suspended campaign events for November's general election and the Spanish football federation postponed the Copa del Rey matches scheduled for Wednesday. The leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, demanded an "immediate" investigation; the president of Andalusia, Juanma Moreno, called for a review of the Madrid-Seville line, where 114 people have died in two crashes in nine months, according to his figures.

The map: the line and the crash site

The map traces the high-speed line between Madrid-Puerta de Atocha and Sevilla-Santa Justa and marks the crash site in red at kilometre 118, near Urda station. The geometry comes from OpenStreetMap relation 1254828, which brings together 246 ways; the cumulative distance calculated on that geometry is 470.5 kilometres, against the corridor's official 471 km.

The red point sits between the two ends of the corridor and shows how far the AVE had travelled before the impact: about 25 kilometres from the moment it was authorised to resume. The map does not reconstruct the sequence of the crash or the speed of the trains; the black boxes and the judicial investigation are the relevant sources for that. What it does establish is the exact place on the line and its relationship with Madrid, Seville and Urda station.

What happens next

Guardia Civil and Military Emergencies Unit teams are still removing wreckage with drones, dogs and heavy machinery to check that no victims remain inside the carriages. The dead will be identified using fingerprints, dental records and DNA. The Guardia Civil has opened offices in Madrid, Toledo, Seville and Córdoba for first-degree relatives to report missing people and provide genetic samples. The Institute of Legal Medicine in Toledo has activated the mass-casualty protocol and the Data Integration Centre is coordinating information. The institute had received 52 bodies and carried out eight autopsies by Thursday morning.

Services between Madrid, Ciudad Real and Andalusia remain suspended. Renfe has stopped selling tickets until December and has set up the number 900 10 10 20 and the Castilla-La Mancha emergency service the number 900 122 112 for families; Iryo's number is 900 001 403. No date has been confirmed for reopening the line or concluding the investigation. The government has announced no resignations. The investigation remains under seal.