One person has died and dozens were injured after a Spanish commuter train crashed into debris from a collapsed wall on railway tracks outside Barcelona, emergency services said.
The accident occurred on Tuesday in Gelida, a municipality about 40 kilometres (25 miles) west of Barcelona in Spain’s northeastern Catalonia region.
It came just two days after a separate train collision in southern Spain killed at least 42 people.
Catalonia fire service inspector Claudi Gallardo said 37 people were injured in the crash, including four who were seriously hurt.
He confirmed that the train driver was the fatality. All passengers were evacuated from the scene.
Catalonia’s civil protection agency said a retaining wall had collapsed onto the tracks, triggering the accident.
Spain’s railway infrastructure operator, ADIF, said the collapse was likely caused by heavy rainfall that swept across the region earlier in the week.
The incident occurred as Spain entered three days of national mourning for victims of Sunday’s deadly train crash in Andalusia, about 800 kilometres (497 miles) away near Adamuz in Cordoba province.
That crash happened at about 7:45pm local time when the rear of a train carrying 289 passengers from Malaga to Madrid derailed and collided with an oncoming train travelling from Madrid to the southern city of Huelva.
The second train, which was carrying 184 passengers, suffered the heaviest impact, with its first two carriages knocked off the track and down a four-metre (13-foot) embankment.
Some victims were found hundreds of metres from the crash site, according to Andalusia’s regional president, Juanma Moreno.
Spain’s Transport Minister Oscar Puente described the crash as “truly strange”, noting that it occurred on a straight section of track and that neither train was speeding.
He said investigators had identified a broken section of rail that may be linked to the accident, but stressed that this remains a hypothesis and that conclusions could take weeks. “All possibilities are still being considered,” Puente said.
Correspondents, reporting from Cordoba, said the latest incident would increase pressure on Spanish authorities to reassure the public about rail safety across the country.
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