Concerns about rail safety in Canada exploded with the Lac-Megantic disaster in 2013. That’s when a runaway train loaded with crude oil derailed and incinerated the downtown, killing 47 people.
Until that Quebec disaster most Canadians were unaware how human error, a runaway train and dangerous goods could converge to bring disaster to a community near them.
But in the three years since the disaster there have been other close calls when unsecured trains or rail cars have rolled away, some of them into highly populated urban areas.
On June 17 this year in Toronto a 74-car CN train with two locomotives took off during a switching operation and travelled more than three kilometres at speeds of up to 29 km/h before it came to a stop on its own on an uphill grade. Three months earlier a hopper car separated from a CP train in Saskatoon and rolled several kilometres over two public train crossings before coming to a stop.
These are not isolated incidents. The Transportation Safety Board reports that in the first half of 2016 there were 24 cases of runaway trains or unsecured rail equipment or cars that rolled away. In 2015 there were 42 such incidents compared with 30 cases in 2014.
Derailments have occurred as close as Edmonton as recently as July 17 when eight empty rail cars left the tracks above the busy 97 Street underpass north of the Yellowhead Trail.
Last month federal Transport Minister Marc Garneau announced one measure to improve rail safety. The type of rail car involved in Lac-Megantic disaster is being phased out for crude oil transport effective this November because it is too easily punctured in a derailment.
This recommendation was just one of 19 made in a June 2016 report from a Parliamentary committee looking into rail safety. The committee made a series of recommendations, some specific to the Lac-Megantic disaster, and others that speak to rail safety issues across the country.
The committee recommends Transport Canada perform more safety audits of rail lines with priority given to those with poor records of performance. It calls for changes that require rail staff to use back up braking systems to secure trains and rail cars when they are parked. It recommends better route planning for dangerous goods transportation. It also advises that communities should be kept informed about the dangerous goods being hauled through their communities. It advises that whistleblowers be protected so they are empowered to report safety concerns without repercussions.
Rail cars transport millions of tons of goods, some of them hazardous, along 46,000 kilometres of rail line that snake through communities across the country. Hundreds of tanker cars pass through St. Albert every week as they serve Alberta’s forestry, agriculture and energy industries on rail lines that run northwest through St. Albert and east of the Campbell Business Park.
St. Albert and communities across Canada are counting on the federal government to implement the recommendations and charge Transport Canada with enforcing them. The consequences of not taking the necessary action could mean disaster along a rail line near you.
