A train carrying 247 people derailed and caught fire near the pilgrimage center of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, causing one of Europe's worst rail disasters of all time.
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At least 73 people were pronounced dead at the scene of the accident and four died in hospitals, said María Pardo Ríos, spokeswoman for the Galicia region's main court. Another person also died, bringing the toll to 78, but no information was immediately available on where.
Another 141 people were injured and treated at area hospitals, with their conditions ranging from light injuries to serious. Some were still in surgery hours after the crash, while others had been treated and released.
"We heard a massive noise and we went down the tracks. I helped get a few injured and bodies out of the train. I went into one of the cars but I'd rather not tell you what I saw there," Ricardo Martínez, a 47-year old baker from Santiago de Compostela, told Reuters.
Investigators have yet to determine the exact cause of the crash, but Spain's El País newspaper reports the train had been traveling at more than twice the speed limit when it derailed, several kilometers from the Santiago station, so they are looking into driver error as a possible cause of the train leaping off the tracks.
The Spanish Interior Ministry has ruled out terrorism, the Associated Press reported, since many feared this tragic event was similar to the Al Qaeda-inspired bombing attack on the railway system in Madrid in 2004 that killed nearly 200 people.
The train driver, whose name has not been released, is under formal investigation according to Pardo Ríos, who added that the train had two drivers and one was in the hospital.
Newspaper accounts cited witnesses as saying one driver, Francisco José Garzón, who had helped rescue victims, shouted into a phone: "I've derailed! What do I do?"
El País said one of the drivers told the railway station by radio after being trapped in his cabin that the train entered the bend at 190 kilometers per hour (120 mph), twice the permitted speed.
"We're only human! We're only human!" he told the station, according to the newspaper, citing sources close to the investigation. "I hope there are no dead, because this will fall on my conscience."
Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, a Santiago de Compostela native, announced two separate investigations into the derailment.
"We have lived through a terrible accident ... which I fear will remain in our memory for a long time," Rajoy said near the site of Wednesday's accident. He added that Spain would observe three days of mourning.
The train was operated by state-owned company Renfe.
Below is the graphic video footage that showed carriages crumpled and lying on their side. Almost all those who perished were found dead on the scene, in an indication of the force of the derailment. A local official compared the scene to Dante's "Inferno."
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