Transportation Safety Board set to recommend new measures
OTTAWA— Better identification of dangerous oil products, a crackdown on old railway tank cars and emergency response plans could be among the key themes identified Thursday by the Transportation Safety Board of Canada as it continues its investigation into the 2013 fatal run- away train disaster in the eastern Quebec town of LacMegantic.
Officials from the board are to unveil the new recommendations at a morning news conference. Their latest recommendations would follow earlier advisories meant to improve some industry practices and monitoring.
Michael Bourque, president of the Railway Association of Canada, said Wednesday that the three areas have already been identified by the federal government, in partnership with industry, as safety areas requiring action, including concerns about the DOT-111 tank cars used by railways that may be a few decades old.
“Those older tanker cars are the ones that have garnered the most attention and which the railway industry has said should be phased out of service for flammable liquids,” Bourque said in an interview.
Transport Minister Lisa Raitt, appointed by Prime Minister Stephen Harper after the Lac-Megantic accident, proposed new regulations on Jan. 10 to require thicker walls on new DOT-111 tank cars.
Raitt also introduced regu- lations in December, that the railway lobby group says it drafted, to increase standards for securing brakes and unattended trains. Following consultations with cities she also introduced a plan requiring companies to share more information with municipal officials and first responders about dangerous cargo going through their communities.
The fatal Lac-Megantic ac- cident, which killed 47 people in the town when the runaway train carrying crude oil crashed, levelling the town’s downtown core in a fiery explosion that contaminated local air, water and soil.
It has prompted questions about whether the department ignored earlier warnings in public and internal audits about weaknesses in its safety oversight.