Spain lowers flags as rescuers search wreckage after deadly train crash
Spain has started three days of mourning after a train collision in the south killed at least 40 people, as rescuers continue searching twisted wreckage.
Spain woke to flags at half staff on Tuesday as the nation began three days of mourning for the victims of the deadly train accident in the country’s south, while emergency crews continue searching for possible bodies.
The official death toll of Sunday’s accident rose to 40 by late Monday. But officials warned that the count may not be definitive, with emergency workers still probing for bodies among what Andalusian regional president Juanma Moreno called “a twisted mass of metal.”
Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska told Spanish national television RTVE late on Monday that searchers believe they have found three more bodies still trapped in the wreckage. Those bodies are not included in the official count, the minister said.
The crash occurred on Sunday at 7:45 p.m. (1845 GMT) when the tail end of a train carrying 289 passengers on the route from Malaga to Madrid went off the rails. It slammed into an incoming train travelling from Madrid to Huelva, another southern Spanish city, according to rail operator Adif.
The head of the second train, which was carrying nearly 200 passengers, took the brunt of the impact. That collision knocked its first two carriages off the track and sent them plummeting down a 4-meter (13-foot) slope. Some bodies were found hundreds of metres from the crash site, Moreno said.
SAR ops underway
Officials are continuing to investigate the causes of the incident that Spanish Transport Minister Oscar Puente has called “strange” since it occurred on a straight line and neither train was speeding.
But Puente said late on Monday that officials had found a broken section of track.
“Now we have to determine if that is a cause or a consequence (of the derailment),” Puente told Spanish radio Cadena Ser.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez visited the accident site near the town of Adamuz on Monday, where he declared three days of mourning with flags lowered on all public buildings and navy vessels. Spain’s King Felipe and Queen Letizia are scheduled to visit on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Spain's Civil Guard is collecting DNA samples from family members who fear they have loved ones among the unidentified dead.