A TRAIN which derailed in the north of Spain killing 18 people and injuring dozens was travelling at more than four times the regulation speed, the state railway chairman, Mr Miguel Corsini, said yesterday.
The train, carrying 248 people returning from Easter holidays, was travelling at 137 k.p.h. when the accident occurred on Monday evening, he said.
The accident happened as the train switched tracks to let another train pass. At that moment its speed should not have been above 30 k.p.h., Mr Corsini told national radio.
"It was going fast, very fast and then just tipped over and made a loud screeching sound," said Jose Antonio Ibero (14), who was going by on his bicycle when the accident happened outside Huarte Arakil, a quiet farming village of 1,000 inhabitants.
"People were trying to climb out of the windows. There was blood everywhere, "he said.
The accident was the first of two in Spain in less than 24 hours for the state railway RENFE. Yesterday morning another train travelling from Barcelona to Malaga was derailed outside Madrid, killing a French woman passenger and a train employee and injuring 16 people. Sixty passengers were on the train at the time.
Rail officials originally said 22 people had died in Monday's derailing but further investigations yesterday put the figure at 19.
However, the Development Minister, Mr Rafael Arias Salgado, said final forensic evidence showed some body parts were later found to belong to victims already counted and that the total killed was 18.
The victims ranged in age from 13 to 64 and were all Spanish.
Ninety people were injured in the accident but only 40 were still in hospital by midday yesterday, a RENFE spokesman, Mr Javier Sevillana, said.
The engine and three of the train's cars tipped over. A fourth derailed but remained upright on the tracks.
"It felt like I was in the movie Earthquake," said Mr Jose de la Poza Lazo (62) who was taken to Pamplona's University Hospital with abdomen and stomach injuries.
"People were falling on the floor. It was terrible," he said.
The track switch normally takes place at another station further north but officials said alternative plans were arranged after that station was damaged by fire, the railway spokesman said.
Police said the station had been damaged by supporters of the Basque separatist group ETA.
Ms Mertxe Sobejano, a resident of Huarte Arakil, said she had long felt that trains coming into the village's station had rounded a corner much too fast.
Dozens of townspeople immediately joined in the rescue operations by distributing blankets, water and other supplies.
As rescue workers worked through the night, the most seriously injured were flown by helicopter to hospitals in nearby Pamplona.