Spain: One dead, 44 hurt as landslide derails train
One person was killed and 44 others were injured today when a commuter train derailed near Barcelona (Spain) due to a landslide caused by heavy rains. Two carriages of a convoy of six came off the tracks at 6:15am (local time) near the town of Vacarisses, 35km northeast of Barcelona, emergency services said on Twitter. Of the 131 people aboard, three were seriously injured.
Images broadcast on Spanish television showed rescue workers evacuating passengers. Rocks piled up on the side of one carriage. The train, which was traveling between Manresa and Barcelona, derailed due to a landslide following several days of heavy rain in the region.
The area was fitted with netting to hold back rocks "but it didn't resist the landslide," Transport Minister Jose Luis Abalos said, adding they would investigate the cause of the accident. Landslides had already caused trains to derail in the same area in 2009 and 2011. No one was injured in 2009 but 11 were lightly hurt in 2011, according to local press reports.
In 2013, 79 people died and over 40 were injured when a train traveling from Madrid to the northwestern city of Santiago de Compostela came off the tracks. It was Spain's worst train wreck for decades. The 1944 Torre del Bierzo crash remains the deadliest.
