Madrid, Jan 23: Spanish investigators on Thursday found two more bodies in the wreckage of a high-speed train involved in a devastating collision last weekend, later confirming the final death toll as 45.
The CID, the official body handling data following Sunday’s crash, confirmed the final toll in a statement on Thursday evening.
An Andalusia emergency services spokesman had earlier told AFP two bodies had been recovered from the train operated by state company Renfe, which smashed into another service by private firm Iryo that had derailed and crossed onto its track.
The collision, which also injured over 120 people, was followed by more rail accidents just days later.
The incidents have raised doubts about the safety of train travel in Spain, the European Union’s fourth-largest economy and a top tourist destination boasting the world’s second-largest high-speed network.
Spain observed three days of national mourning after Sunday’s collision involving two high-speed trains in the southern region of Andalusia — the country’s deadliest rail accident in more than a decade.
Rescuers found the last two bodies after conducting a “more thorough” search of two carriages “in a severely deteriorated condition”, the head of the Civil Guard’s investigative unit, Fernando Dominguez, told journalists.
Of the 45 people killed, all are Spanish apart from three women from Morocco, Russia and Germany, according to the CID.
Spain is searching for answers to what the transport minister has called an “extremely strange” disaster, which happened on a recently renovated stretch of straight, flat track and involved a modern Iryo train.
