Spain train crash live updates: At least 68 killed in high-speed train crash as Spain’s PM says ‘all of Spain is in mourning’

Pinned post from 1.37am
Go to latest

Transport minister speaks on the cause of crash

By

Spain’s Transport Minister Óscar Puente said that the accident was caused by what he called the “inexplicable” order from a central command centre for Spain’s trains after a security system had failed. He said the train engineers were not to blame.

Puente said that at 8:30am the security system on a stretch of 63 kilometers stopped working due to a computer malfunction, causing all trains on that stretch to stop. But the central command told the RENFE train to start running again without any speed restrictions, and it ended up colliding with the stopped IRYO train at 8:53am.

Puente said that the train should never have been told to start moving again since there was still a “stop signal” active that line. And if it had, at least it should have been told to go at reduced speed.

Puente said they were still studying information to see how fast the train was going, but it could have been at 200km/h for that stretch of the track.

“I am not attributing responsibility to anyone, I am just stating the facts,” Puente said.

Reuters