Transport Canada announces new safety rules in wake of Lac-Megantic
Transport Canada and the U.S. Federal Railroad Administration unveiled new rules Wednesday aimed at preventing a repeat of the Lac-Megantic rail tragedy.
Thestar.com
July 29, 2015
By Laurent Bastien Corbeil
Two years after a runaway freight train exploded in Lac-Megantic, killing 47 people, Transport Canada and the U.S. Federal Railroad Administration unveiled new rules Wednesday aimed at preventing a repeat of the tragedy.
The regulations require railway companies to follow stricter guidelines when leaving trains unattended and set out new rules for operators whose job it is to secure tank cars to the tracks.
The Lac-Megantic disaster was one of the worst in the country’s rail history. Much of the town’s downtown core was devastated when the train, hauling millions of litres of oil, derailed and exploded before catching fire on July 6, 2013.
An insufficient number of handbrakes held the Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway train in place where it was parked in Nantes - about 11 km down a descending grade from Lac-Megantic - and none of them had been properly tested.
The provisions announced by Transport Canada were weaker than those made public by its American counterpart. The U.S. transport agency, for instance, requires that two employees verify if each train is properly secured. No such measure is present in the Canadian version.
“Why weren’t these rules in place in July 2013?” said Mark Winfield, a York University professor and expert on Canada’s railway regulations. “It feels like one part of the puzzle, but I think the people who have looked at this disaster see it as a systemic failure.
“The problem is more fundamental than the rules around parking trains.”
For Winfield, the issue at the heart of the Lac-Megantic tragedy is the cosy relationship between the railway companies and the regulators. While issuing new rules governing the application of handbrakes is worthwhile, it is not enough to prevent another derailment, he said.
Wednesday’s announcement was the latest in a string of new regulations enacted in the wake of the disaster - not all of which were made permanent.
In the weeks following the derailment, federal Transport Minister Lisa Raitt issued an emergency directive requiring that trains hauling potentially dangerous cargo be supervised by at least two employees at all times.
But that rule was quashed, a decision described by Keith Stewart of Greenpeace Canada as a mistake.
“The rules being announced today provide new details about how many new brakes must be applied,” he said. “Its good that they have a rule on this, but it’s even better if there’s someone on site that can deal with any problems that arises.”
In December, The Canadian Press reported that CN Rail had lobbied against the emergency provision. At the time, the company said that the measure would be “nearly impossible” to implement.
The fact that the rule was eventually abolished is not a coincidence, Stewart said. Hiring more crew, he said, would have potentially cost CN Rail millions of dollars.
