World

Criminal investigation opened into Canada derailment

Death toll continues to rise as many remain missing in burned-out ruins

Debris from the explosion of a train are seen in Lac Megantic. Many remain missing after four tank cars of petroleum products exploded in the middle of a small town in the Canadian province of Quebec early on Saturday. Photograph: Mathieu Belanger/Reuters
Debris from the explosion of a train are seen in Lac Megantic. Many remain missing after four tank cars of petroleum products exploded in the middle of a small town in the Canadian province of Quebec early on Saturday. Photograph: Mathieu Belanger/Reuters
Wed Jul 10 2013 - 14:03

A criminal investigation has been opened into the runaway oil train crash in a small Quebec town as the death toll climbed to 15, with dozens more bodies feared buried in the burned-out ruins.

Quebec police Inspector Michel Forget said that investigators have “discovered elements” that have led to a criminal probe in Lac-Megantic.

He gave no details but ruled out terrorism and said police are more likely to explore the possibility of criminal negligence. Provincial police spokesman Sergeant Benoit Richard said no arrests have been made.

A combination of satellite photos shows the fire. The fire was visible in an image on the right that was acquired at 06.59am on July 6th by the instrument’s “day-night band,” which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses filtering techniques to observe signals such as city lights, auroras, fires, and reflected moonlight. The image on the left, shown for comparison was acquired by the same instrument on July 4th before the derailment. Light sources are not as crisp in the July 6th image because of cloud cover. Photograph: Handout/Nasa/Reuters
A combination of satellite photos shows the fire. The fire was visible in an image on the right that was acquired at 06.59am on July 6th by the instrument’s “day-night band,” which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses filtering techniques to observe signals such as city lights, auroras, fires, and reflected moonlight. The image on the left, shown for comparison was acquired by the same instrument on July 4th before the derailment. Light sources are not as crisp in the July 6th image because of cloud cover. Photograph: Handout/Nasa/Reuters
A man console his friend at the Polyvanlente Montignac, the school sheltering the people who were forced to leave their houses after the explosion. Photograph: Mathieu Belanger/Reuters
A man console his friend at the Polyvanlente Montignac, the school sheltering the people who were forced to leave their houses after the explosion. Photograph: Mathieu Belanger/Reuters

The death toll rose with the discovery of two more bodies yesterday. About three dozen more people were missing. The bodies that have been recovered were burned so badly they have yet to be identified.

READ MORE

Investigators are focusing on whether a fire on the train a few hours before the disaster set off a deadly chain of events that has raised questions about the safety of transporting oil in North America by rail instead of pipeline.

The unmanned Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway train broke loose early on Saturday and sped downhill in the darkness nearly seven miles before jumping the tracks at 63 mph near the Maine border. All but one of the 73 cars were carrying oil. At least five exploded.

Rail dispatchers had no chance to warn anyone during the train’s 18-minute journey because they did not know it was happening themselves, Transportation Safety Board officials said. Such warning systems are not in place on secondary rail lines, said TSB manager Ed Belkaloul.

The derailment and explosions destroyed about 30 buildings, including the Musi-Cafe, a popular bar that was filled at the time, and forced about a third of the town’s 6,000 residents from their homes.

The same train caught fire hours earlier in a nearby town, and the engine was shut down — standard operating procedure dictated by the train’s owners, Nantes Fire Chief Patrick Lambert said.

Edward Burkhardt, president of the railway’s US-based parent company, Rail World, suggested that shutting off the locomotive to put out the fire might have disabled the brakes.

“An hour or so after the locomotive was shut down, the train rolled away,” he told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

Transportation Safety Board investigator Donald Ross said the locomotive’s black box has been recovered but warned that the investigation was still in its early stages.

The derailment raised questions about the safety of Canada’s growing practice of transporting oil by train, and is sure to support the case for a proposed oil pipeline running from Canada across the US — a project that Canadian officials badly want.

Efforts continued yesterday to stop waves of crude oil spilled in the disaster from reaching the St. Lawrence River, the backbone of the province’s water supply. Environment Minister Yves-Francois Blanchet said the chances were “very slim”.

AP