Photo credit, EPA
It was almost 8:30 a.m. (7:30 a.m. GMT) on a Wednesday like any other. Two high-speed trains were traveling from the south of Madrid, the Spanish capital, to Seville.
A train from the public company Renfe was carrying 397 passengers. Another train, operated by the private company Iryo, preceded it on the same line with 147 passengers on board. A technical problem with the automatic signaling system – a computer failure – forced all trains to stop on the affected section.
Then the impossible happened, Spain's transport minister said, when the Renfe train was ordered to continue on its route "by mistake".
It collided with the rear of the other train between the municipalities of Mora and Orgaz, about 140 km (87 miles) south of Madrid.
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Broken arms, broken noses, a railing through the roof
Some passengers were sleeping, others had already started their workday on their laptops, and still others were scrolling through their apps on their phones.
The journey was interrupted by an announcement reporting traffic jams on the tracks. The incident lasted a few minutes, a little longer for some.
Tangui Binier, 22, was on the Iryo train, in the lead car, number eight. His father was in number seven.
Their train was one of six ordered to stop at 8:30 a.m. A few minutes later, “the train started to accelerate,” Binier told the BBC, “and then it stopped abruptly.”
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Perplexed, he looked out the window and saw "electric wires falling on the left side, then a lot of smoke behind us."
Spanish journalist Roberto Gómez dozed on the Renfe high-speed train that stopped more than 25 km (16 miles) from Binier's home.
The stop was brief. A few minutes later, the train started again, he explained, and that's when the accident happened.
He was unaware that at 8:36 a.m. his train had been ordered to continue its journey and some 17 minutes later the “incredible” happened, said Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente.
“The impact was terrible,” Gómez told Onda Cero radio. “As you can imagine, the wagon is completely destroyed. All the suitcases are scattered everywhere in the damaged wagon. »
Gómez suffered only minor injuries, but described how another passenger fell on him and received a deep gash to the head.
“We were able to help people who had suffered serious chest and rib injuries,” he said.
Rafael Barcelo was in one of the worst-hit cars. A bruise on his forehead makes him a survivor. He was having coffee at the time of the accident and felt a violent shock.
“We were all thrown into the air,” he told the Reuters news agency at the scene of the accident.
“I'm relatively well, my friend is in a much worse state. »
“I was traveling in carriage number seven, the one with the most victims and the most destroyed. I counted at least eight victims in this wagon,” he said, visibly shocked.
Photo credit, Reuters
Even in the carriages furthest from the point of impact on the Renfe train, “everything was completely destroyed: the seats were detached and most of the people traveling facing the train were thrown into the air,” according to Salvador Arriza.
“It was something brutal,” he said, describing how some people “were stuck between the seats.”
Once outside, he saw how serious the situation was.
“What caught my attention was that in one of the carriages there was a piece of rail going through the roof, and I think that may have helped to stop or reduce the inertia of the train. »
Sebastián Herrero was traveling on the train that was hit from behind and the “terrible, terrible impact” threw him onto the front seats.
“After we fell, there were a lot of people with broken noses, broken arms… We started seeing smoke everywhere. »
How could this have happened?
After the initial shock wore off, passengers in Binier's carriage wondered if it was safe to get off because of the electrical wires littering the exterior of the train.
Some, worried about the risk of collision with another train, decided to get off.
“We didn't know anything about what happened until we came out, and then we saw the evidence. »
“We saw the other train behind ours and we saw our train completely overturned, the back end littered with debris,” he told the BBC.
“When I got off the train, I was completely shocked, stunned. There were people in danger, it was very difficult to see, there were corpses, amputees. »
“I don’t know if I’ll ever get over this. »
But the adrenaline took effect, he said, and those, like him, who had suffered no injuries, went to help him.
Among them was his father, who, he explained, had been "able to bring a girl to safety, despite a broken hip."
Neighborhood residents arrived shortly after, followed by police and Guardia Civil ambulance services.
“I am truly one of the luckiest people, the luckiest. I feel so privileged and see other people who aren't so lucky, up close and personal. Sometimes we just ask ourselves, “Why me?” “, he said.
Spain was already reeling from the Adamuz high-speed rail disaster, which occurred in January near Córdoba and left 46 dead.
The accident occurred on the same high-speed rail line, but much further south. It therefore raises many questions for the authorities.
The passengers involved were visibly angry.
“There is no way our train could have been stopped for five or ten minutes without the other train being ordered to stop,” one of them said.
“How is this possible with the technology we have? “, they added. “This is not normal. We were told nothing. It was the driver of the other train who should have been warned. We wouldn't have minded if the other train had been warned. I don't understand. »
We used AI to help translate this article, originally written in English. A BBC journalist checked the translation before publication. Learn more about how we use AI.
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