Contrary to what happens in their airspaces, which in both cases (Mexico and Spain) are considered safe, and given the accident statistics recorded on their railways in the hands of government entities, we can affirm that they are quite dangerous, something that has tragically become clear in the Spanish case on October 28 in Toledo, after a serious accident that left dozens of people dead , just as in the Mexican case, the 14 lives that were lost on December 28, 2025, on a section of the Interoceanic Train in the state of Oaxaca, demonstrate.
The Spanish case is particularly worrying; while since 2013 in that beautiful geography, where the development of its passenger rail transport services is presumed, at least 200 people have died in railway accidents operated by “high-speed” trains, in its skies no person has lost their life in airline accidents in that same period.
The truth is that the bad, and in my opinion justified, reputation of railway services in Spain for being extremely dangerous has worsened in 2026, with two very serious accidents, putting the market in a complicated situation within a business that has made great efforts to take passengers away from airplanes and now faces the challenge of demonstrating with facts that it operates with the safety that users demand and deserve.
As I stated in a recent column, trust is one of the pillars of any means of transport, especially those that operate under a premise of perceived high risk, as is the case with air transport, even associated with a fear as natural in human beings as flying, and in which fortunately things have been done so well in terms of safety that the numbers of victims, or rather the lack thereof, speak for themselves.
I fear that the bad reputation that will accompany Spanish rail services after the Toledo accident will reduce their competitiveness , complicating their already marginal financial profitability.
Anyone who believes that trains are safer than airplanes simply because they stay on the ground, given the poor management of these services by the State, at least in Mexico and Spain, is very, very wrong. Therefore, I hope that this so-called “Fourth Transformation,” which by all accounts will continue to manipulate Mexicans who should be longing for the days when they lived in an imperfect but effective democracy, and which loves passenger trains (even when they are not sustainable), will “get its act together” to guarantee, if not profitability, at least the safety of its operations , and these are not even “high-speed” services.
The main image was created using artificial intelligence .
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