The theft of 150 meters of copper cable at five points on the Madrid-Seville line caused chaos on the High-Speed line between Sunday and Monday, with 30 trains and 10,700 passengers affected by delays of up to 10 hours. The Minister of Transport, Oscar Puente, did not hesitate to speak of “sabotage” given the low economic value of the copper and the significant damage these thefts cause to the network.
However, the allusion to sabotage was already used by Puente a year ago to explain the serious incidents plaguing Rodalies (the commuter rail network of Catalonia), whose management is in the process of being transferred to the Generalitat (the Catalan government). The undeniable fact is that problems are piling up for the minister, who in just over a year and a half has already replaced the presidents of Renfe (the railway operator) and Adif (the infrastructure manager), has accused Talgo, a railway supplier considered strategic by the government, of lacking quality, and has had to face the constant incidents (copper thefts, power outages, derailments…) on the commuter trains of Madrid and Barcelona and on the High-Speed lines.
