Adif President Calls Accusations Over Adamuz Accident “Infamies” as New Critical Cracks Emerge on High-Speed Network

The president of Adif, Luis Pedro Marco de la Peña, appeared last Tuesday before the Congressional Transport Committee to address the serious railway accident that occurred two months ago in Adamuz (Córdoba), which claimed 46 lives.

In his intervention, made at his own request, Marco forcefully rejected accusations pointing to an alleged obstruction of justice and alteration of technical reports, describing such information as “infamies” and “hoaxes.” Before parliamentary spokespersons, especially from the People’s Party and Vox, the executive firmly denied any irregularities in the management of the investigation.

Regarding the progress of the inquiries, Marco detailed the most controversial points to refute the public accusations. Concerning the alleged modification of documents, he clarified that the firm Ayesa only issued an erratum to correct the order of QR codes, without altering the original technical information. Likewise, he defended the actions of Adif workers in removing elements from the track, assuring that this collection was carried out after the official work of the Civil Guard and the Railway Accident Investigation Commission (CIAF) had concluded, and that all material was duly documented and made available to the investigators.

Regarding the prior warnings from drivers and the condition of the rail, Marco specified that the complaints received referred to “comfort and reliability” parameters, not imminent safety problems, suggesting a speed reduction to 250 kilometers per hour. Regarding the hypothesis that the rail had been fractured since the day before the incident, although he confirmed the existence of an anomaly in the voltage data, he was blunt in stating that concluding the track was broken “is a lie.” He explained that the detected voltage drop is not decisive in confirming a breakage, as the circuit threshold had not been reached and the fluctuations could be due to multiple factors.

Parallel to the investigation into the Adamuz accident, the Spanish digital publication The Objective, through reports by journalist Marcos Sierra, has highlighted new problems affecting the Spanish railway network. According to Sierra, Adif has detected a critical crack on the High-Speed line linking Madrid with Valencia, specifically at a switch near Tarancón. Faced with this incident, defined as a “crossing fissure,” the infrastructure manager has been forced to impose a Temporary Speed Restriction (TSR) of 30 km/h in the area, a measure reserved for serious incidents.

This new setback, which according to sector sources is not common on high-speed sections, arises in a context of maximum alert following the Adamuz tragedy. Sources consulted by Marcos Sierra indicate that since the accident, Adif has exercised extreme caution in response to incident reports, which has slowed travel times. The appearance of this crack at a critical point, such as a switch, reignites concern about the state of maintenance of the Spanish railway infrastructure, an issue that journalist Sierra continues to cover extensively and with great interest for all readers.