... Mass held for Spain's train victims Thirty-nine people were killed and around 10 injured when a bus plunged off a viaduct in southern Italy in what Prime Minister Enrico Letta described yesterday as a huge tragedy.
Initial reports suggested that the coach was travelling at speed and had hit four or five cars before crashing over the roadside barriers on a stretch of road near Monteforte Irpino, east of Naples, on Sunday night. There were around 50 people on board, including many children.
It was one of the worst road accidents in Italy's history, and the second transport disaster to hit southern Europe in the space of five days. Seventy-nine people were killed when a high-speed train derailed in the Spanish pilgrimage town of Santiago de Compostela on Wednesday. Letta, on an official visit to Athens, cancelled a private visit to the historic Acropolis before meetings with his Greek counterpart Antonis Samaras.
"It is a very sad day for Italy, what happened last night. There are no words for it," he told reporters. "It is a huge tragedy." Also, at least 40 people were injured, four of them seriously, in a collision between two trains in western Switzerland, yesterday. The crash happened in Granges- pres-Marnand, about 50km (30 miles) south-west of the capital, Bern.
Reports say the regional trains collided head-on in the early evening. Public TV station SRF quoted Vaud canton police spokesman Pierre-Olivier Gaudard as saying that one person was yet to be recovered from the wreckage.
Meanwhile, a large Mass was held yesterday in north-western Spain for the 79 people who died in a train crash. The service was held in the Galician city of Santiago de Compostela, a Catholic pilgrimage site where the train derailed last week. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who comes from the city, and members of the royal family were expected to attend. Train driver Francisco Jose Garzon Amo, who faces charges of reckless homicide, was released from custody on Sunday.
Santiago officials had been preparing for the religious feast of St James of Compostela – Spain's patron saint – but cancelled it after the crash on Wednesday. At the city's cathedral gates, pilgrims have left flowers and candles to commemorate victims of the crash. Officials say 70 people remain in hospital, 22 of them in a critical condition.
A statement from motorway operator Autostrade per l'Italia said the coach appeared to have been travelling fast in the vicinity of slower-moving traffic, even though the lower speed had been clearly indicated.
"You would think that the barriers on the viaducts and bridges should prevent this type of accident but evidently it seems the impact was so strong that even the barrier gave way," said Alessio Barbarulo, head of the local fire brigade division that coordinated the rescue effort.
National Mirror