Victims' families demand answers in deadly Mexico train crash as
authorities promise to investigate
[December 30, 2025]
By RAMÓN BRAGAÑA and EDGAR CLEMENTE
EL ESPINAL, Mexico (AP) — Survivors and families of the victims of a
deadly train crash in southern Mexico demanded answers on Monday as the
government vowed to investigate what caused a train to derail the day
before on a rail line connecting the Pacific Ocean with the Gulf of
Mexico.
Thirteen people, including a teenager, died when the Interoceanic Train
linking the states of Oaxaca and Veracruz — with 250 people on board —
went off the rails on Sunday as it passed by a curve in near a town in
Oaxaca. Nearly 110 people were injured.
Videos from the scene show train cars that had fallen off the side of a
steep hill into dense jungle below as other cars lay toppled on their
side.
In 2023, Mexico's then-President Andrés Manuel López Obrador inaugurated
the train line as part of a government push to expand the railway and
connectivity in rural swaths of Mexico. Hic critics noted that many of
the president's infrastructure projects were quickly constructed, often
dodging regulatory bureaucracy and environmental impact studies.
López Obrador's ally and successor, President Claudia Sheinbaum, told
reporters on Monday she was heading to the region and that the train and
the infrastructure had been working correctly.
“Our first priority is taking care of the victims," she said. “The
second is rigorously investigate what caused this accident.”
A family's despair
Hector Serrano Garcia, whose 15-year-old daughter Luisa was killed in
the crash, was overcome with grief as he gathered with family members in
a small funeral home in Oaxaca.
Carmen García, Luisa's grandmother who was also on the train, begged on
Sunday night on social media for help in finding her granddaughter.
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“We haven't been able to find her anywhere,” the grandmother said
late Sunday night. “Please, everyone, touch your hearts, it's my
granddaughter.”
Serrano Garcia said the family received the tragic news that Luisa
was killed on Monday.
“We’ve had very little information," he said. “It's been incredibly
hard for all the families.”
‘It was going very fast’
Baldo Enríquez Antonio said his wife, Ana Guadalupe Fabre, and their
16-year-old son were both on the train, returning home to Veracruz
after spending Christmas with relatives in Oaxaca.
They told him the train “was going very fast on the curves,” he said
over the phone from a hospital in southern Oaxaca.
Fabre broke several ribs in the crash and their son hurt his leg and
had a gash on his forehead where he suffered a bad cut, Enríquez
Antonio told The Associated Press.
Despite his own injuries, their son pulled his mother out of their
toppled train car.
When asked about the speed of the train, Sheinbaum said she had seen
videos of survivors talking about the speed but warned that “we
shouldn’t speculate” but let the "prosecutors do their job.”
___
Clemente reported from Tapachula, Mexico. Associated Press writer
Megan Janetsky in Mexico City contributed to this report.
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