Train crash disaster that claimed 68 lives sparks violent demonstrations and clashes with riot cops in Madrid as audio of controller's 'catastrophic error' emerges

Violent demonstrations erupted in Madrid last night amid growing public anger over the failures that led to Wednesday's deadly train collision, which claimed 68 lives. It comes as an audio recording from the control centre, made minutes before the crash, has emerged, revealing how operators failed to warn one of the train drivers of the impending collision. Riots erupted outside the Ministry of Transport, with protesters demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and transport minister Oscar Puente.The tragic incident yesterday saw three carriages derailed when a Renfe train travelling from Madrid to Seville collided with a stationary Iryo one on the same route near the city of Toledo shortly before 9am yesterday.It left 68 people dead and more than 100 injured in scenes described as 'apocalyptic' by surviving passengers, who said the damage was 'as if a bomb had been planted'.This is Spain's third deadly railway disaster this year alone, with two incidents in January leaving a total of 47 people dead and dozens injured. According to local reports, a demonstration that began at 8pm yesterday near Nuevos Ministerios was initially peaceful before escalating into direct clashes between protesters and police. Demonstrators began overturning bins, while at least one person set a fire. Footage shows police forcefully pushing back protesters carrying banners and waving Spanish flags. According to local reports, a demonstration that began at 8pm yesterday near Nuevos Ministerios was initially peaceful before escalating into direct clashes People were heard chanting 'Pedro Sanchez is to blame' and 'Oscar Puente is a murderer,' demanding the politicians resign Footage shows police forcefully pushing back protesters on Wednesday night Protesters hold a flag with a picture of Pedro Sanchez and the words 'Get out!'People were heard chanting 'Pedro Sanchez is to blame' and 'Oscar Puente is a murderer,' demanding the politicians resign.Officers from the Riot Control Unit were forced to use pepper spray and rubber bullets to disperse the crowd.Speaking to El Mundo, one protester said of the scenes last night: 'We weren't doing anything, and at one point, they pushed us violently and started telling us to leave. When they saw that many people weren't moving, they tear-gassed us. There are elderly people here.' Several hard-right groups, including Revuelta, endorsed by Spain's political party VOX, are said to have urged more demonstrations throughout Spain.And yesterday evening, audio recordings emerged revealing how, in the minutes before the crash, control centre operators failed to warn the Renfe train driver that a signal failure had left the Iryo train stationary on the tracks. The recordings reveal that at 8.41am, the Iryo train driver told the control centre that the LZB safety system had failed and she was stopped at the Urda entry signal.The controller authorised her to resume normal travel, despite giving the same instruction to the Renfe train approaching from behind five minutes earlier, failing to warn it of the signal failure and stopped train ahead.At 8.48am, just five minutes before the crash, the Iryo driver called again, warning she still could not restart the system. The controller told her to try again and call back if she had any problems.Transport Minister Oscar Puente said on Wednesday that an automatic control system went down on 69 kilometres (43 miles) of track, causing all trains there to be stopped.But the control centre decided to 'resume traffic in circumstances that, from our point of view, are inexplicable,' Puente said, with the Renfe train travelling 25 kilometres before striking the Iryo.The control centre 'had more than enough time to verify the error, and they did not fix it', he added.Flags flew at half-mast on public buildings on Thursday as the country observed a day of mourning, with official ceremonies and public events cancelled or scaled back as a mark of respect for the victims. Investigators survey debris amongst the damaged carriages of a train crash between two high-speed trains A damaged carriage is removed with heavy machinery at the site of a train crash between two high-speed trains Emergency services combed through the train wreckage overnight to find further victims on the key line linking Madrid with the southern city of Seville, hoisting pieces of mangled metal with cranes.At daybreak, police drones were once again flying over the crash site a few kilometres from the small village of Urda.A school in Urda, around 130 kilometres south of Madrid, is being used to allow relatives to enquire about their loved ones.Teams of Red Cross workers offered support to groups of people who arrived, some of them in tears, amid crowds of police and journalists from around the world.Red Cross psychologist Carmen Garcia said 'long and hard hours' were in store because 'every person will manage it in their own way.'We have people who are in shock, who haven't taken on board what has happened, angry people, sad, worried people. The grieving will be complicated,' Garcia said.Surviving passengers described horrific scenes following the crash yesterday morning.Sebastian Herrero, 46, who was travelling on the Iryo train, said he was 'thrown against the seats' when the trains collided, and described how he was 'in the air for about four or five seconds', which felt like 'a lifetime'.He added: 'There are three carriages of the Iryo, the three at the end, from which they keep taking people out and putting sheets on them. Corpses. It's apocalyptic.'In those carriages, I find it very hard to believe there are any living people. It's a twisted mass of metal. It's as if they had planted a bomb.'A survivor named Jesus said: 'I saw a boy with an amputated arm walking away from the wreckage.'Architect Joaquín Torres described the death of a horrifically injured fellow passenger.He said: 'I went up to a woman who said she was cold... she died in my arms. It was horrible, [she was] without legs, without arms.' A passenger rescued from one of the trains involved in a collision arrives in Urda, Spain Two people wait for updates outside a support center for relatives of missing victims in Urda A Red Cross volunteer comforts a woman outside a support center for relatives of missing victims in UrdaOne carriage caught fire and smoke was still pouring from the mangled wreckage as emergency responders reached the scene. It emerged last night that Fatima Banez, Spain's former employment minister, was among the dead.Horrifying photographs showed a carriage impaled on a long steel rail that was forced through the floor and out of the roof.Others showed passengers climbing out of twisted, broken carriages. David Gomez, a construction worker, was on a job with his brother and a colleague nearby when they heard the crash and ran to help.'People were trying to get out through the windows. We cut through some fences to access the area and treated people with first-aid kits we brought,' he said. 'As I was trying to pull a young woman out, there was a piece of a leg.'One survivor said his carriage was 'completely wrecked', adding: 'The impact was tremendous.'The carriage was completely destroyed. A man fell on top of me, but we were able to help him. It was a very dramatic scene.'Another passenger said she was left 'spinning on the floor' by the impact.