Spain train collision: survivors' accounts and the death toll

On Wednesday morning, an Iryo train and an AVE train operated by the state carrier Renfe collided near Toledo, Spain. According to the government of the Castilla-La Mancha region, at least 64 people died and about a hundred more were injured. Two carriages left the rails on impact and fell down an embankment, and the number of victims continues to rise.

The collision came just nine months after another railway tragedy. Spanish media are now publishing accounts from those who survived.

“It is an apocalypse”

Sebastián Herrero, 46, was travelling on the Iryo train. He describes the scene after the crash as people being carried out and covered with sheets constantly, an “apocalyptic” picture. “All that was left of the train was a pile of scrap metal, as if a bomb had gone off there,” he says.

A priest from the nearby village of Consuegra, a few kilometres from the crash site, came to give the injured the last rites. He said there were many victims in very serious condition, mostly young people, and that he had never faced anything like it before, the Spanish newspaper El País reports. Ambulances and funeral services are still arriving at the scene.

Passengers' accounts

Journalist Miguel Ángel Pérez, who was on the AVE, says he survived by a miracle, as did the passengers in the first and second carriages. He calls what happened a terrible and indescribable experience. Passenger Cristina Cuerva told Canal Sur radio that the train stopped several times before the collision, then braked very sharply and she found herself on the floor.

Survivors say suitcases were flying through the air, there were screams, and people fell on top of one another. A man travelling from Madrid told Onda Cero radio that he was thrown across four or five seats and that there were dead in his carriage. Next to him he saw a person pinned under pieces of metal.

Eduarda, 17, was travelling to Seville with her sister and two cats. She recalls people with bloodied faces and a young man whose pulse she checked and whom she tried to keep conscious. An AVE passenger named Jesús, who broke his nose and injured his arm, told Hoy por hoy radio that he concentrated on helping others and, together with the rest, pulled people out through a window.

Tension at Atocha station

Relatives of passengers on both trains are gathering at Madrid's Atocha station, and the atmosphere there is tense. A rescue service worker told El País that those who cannot reach their loved ones are especially distressed, either because the passengers have no phone or because they do not know what happened.

Around Prague, based on reporting by seznamzpravy.cz