Spain rail disaster: At least 39 dead in crash between two high-speed trains in Toledo province

At least 39 people are believed dead after a high-speed train slammed into the rear of another train that had stopped on the same line in central Spain.

Spanish authorities had earlier put its confirmed death toll at 10, but Esther Padilla, a spokeswoman for the Castilla La Mancha region, said “that number will surely rise.”

The Sun released the higher figure shortly after the incident was confirmed shortly after 9am, local time, Wednesday in the province of Toledo by rail system operator ADIF. Rail service was suspended between Madrid, Ciudad Real and Andalusia.

It was the second major train accident in Spain this year.

Padilla told state broadcaster TVE that the accident was between two high-speed trains carrying hundreds of passengers and heading in the same direction from the capital Madrid to Seville in southwestern Spain. One ran into the tail of the other that had stopped, knocking two of its cars off the track. She said the cause of the crash was not known.

The crash, which occurred in a flat stretch surrounded by fields in between the towns of Urda and Los Yébenes, left one car shredded into bits of metal and other material, scattering debris down a gravel slope.

Spanish Health Minister Mónica García told TVE that emergency workers were focusing on rescuing survivors and bodies from the two most damaged train cars. She said that the injured are being sent to different hospitals in the area.

“It was a high-speed impact, so we are expecting this to be a tragedy,” García said.

The accident involved a train from Spain’s state-owned RENFE company and the private rail company IRYO. It appeared the RENFE train rammed the IRYO train, Spanish media reported. Trains from those two companies were also involved in a deadly crash in January.

Padilla said that 397 passengers were in the RENFE train and 147 passengers in the IRYO train.

IRYO, an Italian-owned company, said in a statement that it has “activated its security protocols and is closely working with authorities.”

The mayor of the nearby town of Urda, Manuel Galán, told Spanish state broadcaster TVE that civil protection authorities had asked his town hall to prepare a sports pavilion to attend to injured passengers.

A military emergency brigade was deployed to help emergency services, firefighters and police to the crash site.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez cancelled his agenda to focus on the crash. He wrote on X that he was “dismayed by the serious train accident in Toledo.”

“Emergency services are working on site to attend to the affected passengers,” wrote Sánchez, who faces a national election next month. “All my thoughts are with the victims and their families.”

The regional president of Castilla La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page, wrote on X that he was on his way to the crash site.

In January, 45 people died in southern Spain when a train jumped the track and hit an oncoming train. The crash was the deadliest in Spain since a 2013 crash that killed 80 people. The January incident shook the confidence the European country has in its extensive high-speed rail network.