“It’s inexplicable.” This is how Transportation Minister Oscar Puente described the accident that occurred in Urda (Toledo) on the morning of October 28, 2026. There a Renfe AVE ran over an Erio which was stopped on the road. This is the second serious accident so far this year after the Adamuz (Córdoba) accident last January.
But what happened this time? We reconstruct what happened minute by minute to understand the keys.
07:54. Iryo 6076 departs Atocha for Seville with 147 people on board.
08:00. Six minutes later, AVE 2080 departed with the same destination and 397 passengers. They both travel on the same road and in the same direction.
08:30. The LZB security system falls due to a computer problem.
Traffic stopped. Automatically, once the LZB system is down, traffic stops immediately. The problem affects a 69-km stretch where, according to preliminary investigations, six trains are located. Oscar Puente, in his statement to the media, admitted that he did not rule out that more trains were stopped in that section.
CRC takes over. As traffic is stopped, it controls the Atocha control center. In the next minute, workers ordered the trains to continue traveling “as normal”.
8:36. AVE 2080 receives orders to continue traveling “normally”. Even though there is a red signal in front of the driver, he is ordered to proceed from the control center. Protocol dictates that this be done “on sight”. That is, the emergency brake must travel slowly enough to stop the train. However, he naturally received promotion orders.
a correction. All affected trains have been ordered to “run normally”. However, a train driver warns the control center that this cannot be. In the control center they correct and confirm that it should be “running on sight”. That is very slow.
Erio stays still. A big question is why the Erio train was stopped on the tracks. At the press conference, Oscar Puente noted that they believe this driver was also ordered to continue but he could not confirm this. This is something that has yet to be resolved.
8:36-8:53. AVE 2080 gradually restores normal circulation speed. He travels 25 kilometers without warning that the erio ahead of him has stopped on the road.
8:53. Time is still fixed. AVE reached 2080 Iryo 6076 It hit it at a speed that has yet to be confirmed, although some data suggests it exceeded 100 km/h. Both the trains derailed and some cars fell down the embankment.
Picture | Civil Guard
In Xataka | The LZB system that failed in the Toledo accident was supposed to be completely replaced by ERTMS-2 in 2026.
