The driver whose speeding train crashed, killing 78 people, is now being held on suspicion of negligent homicide, Spain’s interior minister says.

The Spanish justice department has said the driver of the train that derailed on Wednesday will not be appearing before a judge today as had been hoped.

Investigations into Spain’s deadliest train crash in decades have only begun, but already a key question has been answered: experts said that the driver, not a computer, was responsible for applying the brakes because a no “fail-safe” system has been installed on the dangerous stretch of bending track.

A train driver suspected of causing Spain’s deadliest train disaster for 70 years has refused to answer police questions, Spanish officials have confirmed.

Investigators probing the Spanish rail disaster are focusing on the key question of why the train was going so fast.

The driver of a Spanish train was taken into custody in hospital last night after at least 80 people died when it derailed and caught fire in a crash which was reportedly caused by excessive speed.

A Spanish train that hurtled off the rails and smashed into a security wall as it rounded a bend was going so fast that carriages tumbled off the tracks like dominos, killing 80 people and maiming dozens more, according to eyewitness accounts and video footage obtained today.

A Spanish train that hurtled off the rails and smashed into a security wall as it rounded a bend was going so fast that carriages tumbled off the tracks like dominos, according to eyewitnesses and video footage.

Spanish investigators were today trying to find out why a passenger train jumped the tracks and sent eight cars crashing into each other killing at least 77 people and injuring more than 140.

Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy is heading to the scene of the crash in north-western Spain that killed 77 people in one of the country’s worst rail accidents in decades.

At least 77 people have been killed and more than 100 injured as a passenger train derailed in north-western Spain, according to reports.

A train travelling in north-eastern Spain has derailed, toppling passenger cars on their sides and leaving at least one torn open as smoke rose into the air.