Thursday, May 28, 2015

TIMBER RAIL BRIDGE CROSSING THE RAT RIVER DESTROYED BY FIRE NEAR INTERNATIONAL FALLS, MN, SEVERAL CARS CARRYING POTASH DAMAGED, RESIDENCES EVACUATED







MAY 28, 2015

ERICSBURG, MINNESOTA

A timber rail bridge burned and collapsed early Wednesday in Koochiching County, tipping two rail cars onto the banks of the Rat Root River and temporarily blocking a Canadian National rail artery that connects the Pacific Coast with Chicago.

The cause of the fire is still unclear, though the state fire marshal is helping with the investigation, said Perryn Hedlund, sheriff of Koochiching County.

“We’re looking at every angle; we’re not jumping to conclusions,” Hedlund said.
There were no reports of injuries, or word on when service would resume on the busy rail line.

The crew of a southbound train carrying potash — a non-flammable farm fertilizer — reported the fire just after 12:30 a.m., CN spokesman Brent Kossey said.  Koochiching County Sheriff Perryn Hedlund said the bridge that burned crossed the Rat Root River, just north of Ericsburg and about 8 miles southeast of International Falls.

“As soon as (the crew) came around the corner, (they) saw the flames,” Hedlund said. A crew member “applied his emergency brakes as soon as he saw the flames.”

When the train came to a stop, several cars were on the burning bridge. By the time the crew could prepare the train to start moving again, those cars were stranded in the fire.

The crew uncoupled the cars on the bridge. Hedlund said the original locomotive — on the south side of the bridge — and another locomotive called in from Ranier, to the north, cleared the unaffected cars that were on either side of the bridge.

A couple hours later the bridge gave way; two rail cars on the bridge shifted but did not fall into the river, Hedlund said. Kossey said the cars remained intact and had not spilled their cargo.

Several nearby homes initially were evacuated until authorities could determine what was aboard the burning cars, Hedlund said. 

Hedlund said the cause of the fire has not yet been determined, and local authorities and the State Fire Marshal’s Office were assisting CN and police with the investigation.

Hedlund praised the response of local law enforcement and fire personnel to the early morning incident, calling their efforts “picture-perfect.”

The collapsed bridge is on a major rail line that sees about 24 trains a day, as reported in the News Tribune earlier this month. The line crosses the border at Ranier — the busiest rail crossing between the U.S. and Canada — and continues south to Duluth.

CN did not immediately respond to questions about how long it expects the rail line to be out of service while a replacement bridge is built.

The railroads generally help each other in situations like this, Gross said, and CN could reroute eastbound trains onto BNSF and Canadian Pacific lines that come down from Manitoba into northwest Minnesota.

The incident highlights growing anxiety in Ranier, a village of 150 that has seen freight rail traffic from Canada surge in recent years.

The bridge across the Rainy River from Fort Frances, Ontario, to Ranier was built in 1907 and had long been a quiet crossing. But now it carries more than 20 trains a day that are up to two miles long, said Dennis Wagner, mayor of Ranier.

“Something’s going to happen,” Wagner said. “It’s just freaking math.”

Wagner said about 19 percent of all freight rail traffic across the border passes through Ranier and then Ericsburg. The burned bridge makes him worry that a similar incident could happen in downtown Ranier.

“What happens when this other bridge that’s 120 years old collapses? Oh! Imagine that. And then it fills the whole Rainy River full of oil and gas,” he said. “Rail safety and bridge safety has been an issue of major concern around here.”