Trains in Europe are getting safer despite recent tragedies in Spain

Spain was once regarded as a world leader in rail systems, but after suffering two of its deadliest train incidents in over a decade this year alone, questions have emerged.

The country has commenced three days of mourning after at least 69 people died, and dozens more were injured, after two high-speed trains collided just south of the capital Madrid on Wednesday.

A computer system failure saw six trains stopped on just over 60km of track between Madrid and Seville, while another was manually given clearance to move, according to Spain's Transport Minister Óscar Puente.

What are the recent incidents in Spain?

Spain's high-speed rail network, operated by state-owned RENFE, is among the largest in the world, second only to China.

In January, 46 people died on the same rail network after two high-speed trains carrying around 400 passengers collided.

It was the first fatal incident along Spain's dedicated high-speed rail lines since its opening in 1992.

According to European Union data, rail fatality rates in Europe have decreased over the last decade, and last year recorded no fatalities or major accidents.

However, a series of accidents in 2023 saw a spike in those numbers.

Between 2022 and 2024, Spain had some of the fewest fatalities per million train kilometres in Europe.

University of Sydney's Rico Merkert, who specialises in European transport systems, said isolated incidents shifted people's perception around safety.

"There are so many trains, including high-speed trains, operated or run each and every day in Europe. There are millions of people travelling on those trains," Professor Merkert said.

"One incident is catastrophic and really not good and very tragic in terms of the number of fatalities.

"But statistically speaking, it's still safe due to the large volumes of passengers using trains and high-speed trains every single day in Europe."

He added that the European Train Control System (ETCS) prevented trains from reaching excessive speeds and could recognise when there was potential for a collision.

"The problem with the accident that happened [this week] is that there was a signalling sort of failure,"he said.

"There was a system issue, so it broke down, and it's not quite clear whether that ETCS system was actually operating at all or partially unavailable. It looks like that system failure caused manual operations or signalling."

How does train safety in Europe compare?

A report into railway safety from the European Union found Australia, South Korea and the EU were among the safest railway systems between 2022 and 2024.

It also looked into passenger fatalities and found Japan was the safest, with no fatalities recorded.

Professor Merkert said it was difficult to compare Australia's rail system to Europe, because it does not have high-speed trains.

"[It] is not comparing apples with apples … high-speed trains are between 250 and 300 kilometres an hour, and you simply don't have those trains operating here in Australia," he said.

The report into railway safety said the gap in passenger fatality rates between Europe and Japan would be difficult to close in the medium term.

Professor Merkert said that was due to Japan's long tradition of running high-speed rail safely and efficiently.

"Similarly, China, they had a few incidents themselves, but overall again, the number of trains that they're operating and the number of people using those trains without having any accidents is quite remarkable," he said.

He said overall railway systems were safe, but once automated, additional safety procedures were required.

"There needs to be manual safeguards and governance structure in place that prevent things like what has happened [this week], and that simply seems to not have occurred,"he said.