San Francisco Frontiers - Spanish village holds memorial mass for train crash victims

The pews inside the San Juan Bautista church in Urda, in the central province of Toledo, were packed, while dozens more people gathered outside to listen to the service. Some wiped away tears.

Investigators are looking into the cause of one of Europe's deadliest rail disasters this century, which occurred when a train travelling from Madrid to Seville crashed into a stationary train on Wednesday.

Archbishop of Toledo Francisco Cerro acknowledged that "there are no words that can offer comfort" to those who had lost loved ones.

But he added: "Dear families affected by the train accident, you are not alone. Society is with you, the best of society is with you."

He urged the public not to forget the tragedy, calling for such disasters never to happen again.

He also paid tribute to emergency service workers and volunteers, praising what he described as "a genuine wave of solidarity".

The president of the Castilla-La Mancha region, Emiliano Garcia-Page, and Urda mayor Manuel Galan were among those attending the service.

- 'In great pain' -

Residents of Urda, which has a population of around 2,500, "are very badly affected, in great pain and with a great need for support", Galan told Spanish public television ahead of the mass.

Village pharmacist, 78-year-old Antonio Garcia Colina, said he had rushed to the scene of the crash in his car shortly after it happened to try to help the injured and witnessed several people dying.

"As I walked toward the scene of the disaster, toward ground zero, I started seeing that the passengers were in bad shape as they were being pulled out of the train cars," he told AFPTV, describing the scene as "hellish".

Relatives of the victims, who have been providing DNA samples to help identify the dead, face an agonising wait for news as rescue teams continue to sift through the wreckage and forensic experts work to identify the bodies.

Authorities overseeing the process have completed autopsies on all 69 people killed in the crash, with 56 identified so far, according to their latest update.

Of those identified, 54 were Spanish nationals and two were foreign nationals -- one French and the other Portuguese.

In January, 46 people were killed when one train derailed and slammed into the side of another travelling in the opposite direction on the same route, near the southern village of Adamuz.

D.Robinson--SFF