[Magdalen] Derailment, Please Pray

[Jim Guthrie]

From: Cantor03 at aol.com 
>I notice the aerial clips of the accident site show the engine to be very
>close to what looks like oil tank cars, yet I do not see or hear mention of
>this.  If they are filled oil tank cars, and the train plowed into them, it would be
>a REAL mess.

There’s little or no oil transported on the Corridor. In fact, there’s very little freight at all.

There may be chemical cars of one sort or another. 

Despite these occasional events, I still think rails are the way to go.
It's wonderful that the USA railroads have rebounded as nicely
in recent years as they have.

As for oil cars, let’s be clear: Oil Trains ran successfully and safely for well over 100 years –famously in the beginnings of the oil industry when Rockefeller engages railroads to move oil from Northwestern Pennsylvania to Cleveland (and made a fortune at it!). Fat forward to World War II when oil (and Gasoline) was supplied along both coasts as it was not safe to send tankers through coastal waters with U-Boats nearby. 

What has changed n that authorities in South Dakota decided that they would take a regulatory shortcut and allow shipments of high volatility (it should be noted that some oil elsewhere even has a chemical added to reduce volatility!).

Despite that, it should be noted that there have been far fewer Bakken oil derailments/explosions/leaks than incidents with pipelines or oil/gasoline delivery trucks – and several people have been killed.

No one has lost a life due to oil trains per se. Lac Megantic was an outlier, caused by rail crews who reached their legal hours of service limit and failed to secure a train when the  “outlawed.: And the company that operated that train was run by Ayn Rand aficionados and imparting an anti-regulation, ignore the rule “corporate culture.” They read Atlas Shrugged and thought knew how  to run a railroad.

Finally, Keystone XL vs BNSF is really Koch Bros vs. Warren Buffet. Stopping Keystone does not stop tar sands oil – only rerouting it so Buffet sees the transportation profit. Gotta love the ignorance of the activists on that score.

Cheers,
Jim Guthrie