Spanish bullet train service between between Madrid and Barcelona resumes

Passengers on Spain’s busiest high-speed train route between the tourist and business hub i.e. Madrid and Barcelona, faced delays due to rail disruption in connection with cable theft

Spanish state-owned railway operator Renfe suspended the bullet train service between Madrid and Barcelona for five hours on Monday morning after cables were stolen, the company said in a statement.

Train passengers wait with their luggage at Atocha train station in Madrid, Spain, Monday, Aug. 8, 2022. Hundreds of passengers were stranded Monday morning in Madrid and Barcelona train stations as the bullet-train railway linking both cities was sabotaged during the night. The Spanish railway infrastructure company ADIF reported the theft of some 600 meters of optic fiber cable during the night in the Catalonia region which led to the suspension of the train service for most of Monday morning.   (AP Photo/Paul White)

A 19-year-old man was detained after he was found close to train tracks near Santa Oliva in Catalonia, local police said on Twitter, adding that further arrests have not been ruled out.

Renfe established an alternative train route bypassing the high-speed network to take travellers from the capital to the country's second-largest city, Barcelona, the statement said.

At 11:15 local time, after more than five hours of suspension, the train service between Spain's two largest cities resumed.

The tourism industry's vigorous post-pandemic recovery this summer has stretched Spain's transport infrastructure, as it has in other European countries, leaving it vulnerable to any kind of disruption.