The safety of high-speed rail travel is under intense scrutiny following a devastating accident in southern Spain. On Sunday, 18 January 2026, an Iryo service travelling from Malaga to Madrid derailed and collided with a Renfe express train running from Madrid to Huelva near Adamuz in Andalusia. Dozens of passengers lost their lives in the incident.
A History of European Rail Tragedies
This latest disaster evokes memories of other serious accidents across the continent. For Spain, the worst rail tragedy of the 21st century occurred in July 2013 at Santiago de Compostela, where 79 people died after a driver took a curve at more than double the speed limit.
Elsewhere in Europe, a German ICE train derailed near Eschede in June 1998 due to a wheel rim failure, killing 101 people. More recently, in February 2023, a head-on collision between a passenger and a freight train at Tempi in Greece resulted in 57 fatalities.
How Does Britain's Rail Safety Record Compare?
The UK has experienced its own dark periods for rail safety. A series of fatal accidents occurred between 1999 and 2002, including the Ladbroke Grove collision (31 deaths) and the Potters Bar derailment (7 deaths). Since then, serious incidents have been rare, with fatal derailments at Greyrigg in 2007 and Carmont in 2020 claiming a small number of lives.
Statistically, Britain remains a very safe place to travel by train. Approximately 50 billion passenger-miles are completed on the UK rail network each year. In contrast, around 1,650 people die annually on British roads. If rail travel had the same fatality rate as roads, there would be an estimated 215 rail passenger deaths each year; in reality, most years see none.
Trains vs. Roads and Air: The Safety Verdict
The data consistently shows that rail is a significantly safer mode of transport than road travel, both in the UK and across Europe. Spain, despite this latest tragedy and its history, still has a far higher death toll from road accidents. Independent analysis suggests if Spanish high-speed rail had the same fatality rate as the country's roads, there would be around 125 deaths per year on the trains, a figure vastly higher than the actual toll.
Air travel also boasts an excellent safety record. The UK has seen no fatal accidents involving British passenger jets since the 1980s, and Ryanair, which operates extensively in the UK, is noted as one of the world's safest airlines.
While any loss of life is a profound tragedy, the statistical evidence underscores that high-speed rail travel remains one of the safest ways to journey, even in the wake of devastating but exceptionally rare events like the Adamuz crash.
