Search for victims of Spanish train crash continues as mourning begins

Spain will begin three days of mourn ing today as rescuers continue to comb through the wreckage of twisted train cars and scattered debris to locate victims after a train collision that killed at least 40 people and injured dozens of others.

- Sam Jones Adamuz Ashifa Kassam Madrid

Yesterday, more than 18 hours after a high-speed train carrying about 300 Madrid-bound passengers derailed and collided with an oncoming train, people across the country were still scrambling to make contact with missing loved ones caught up in Spain's worst rail disaster in more than a decade.

Juan Barroso said five members of his extended family had been among the nearly 200 people heading from Madrid to the southern city of Huelva by train. In the aftermath of the collision near Adamuz in Córdoba province, just one of them, a six-yearold child, had been accounted for.

"Now we're searching for the four who are missing," Barroso told reporters. "We've been all over. All of the hospitals in Jaén, Úbeda, and in Córdoba."

Others took to social media, posting photos of their loved ones and pleading for people to get in touch. "If anyone in Adamuz recognises this man, he's my father, please contact me," read one message.

Police said they had opened several offices where people could file reports and "provide DNA samples for the purpose of identification".

Speaking to reporters during a visit to the site, the country's prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, vowed that the investigation into the cause of the crash would be full and transparent.

"Spanish society, like all of us, is wondering what happened, how it happened, how this tragedy could have occurred," he told reporters as he declared three days of mourning. "I'm convinced that time and the work of experts will provide us with those answers."

The collision occurred just before 8pm on Sunday, when the rear part of the Madrid-bound train came off the rails and into the path of an oncoming train.

The impact knocked the first two carriages of the southbound train off the track, sending it plummeting down a four-metre (13ft) slope, Spain's transport minister, Óscar Puente, said.