In this Dec. 30, 2013 file photo, a fireball goes up
at the site of an oil train derailment near Casselton, N.D. On Monday, April
27, 2015, federal investigators released hundreds of pages detailing the fiery
2013 derailment that forced 1,400 to evacuate for several days. Interviews with
the BNSF workers operating the two trains in the derailment are included in
what the National Transportation Safety Board posted online.
APRIL 27, 2015
WASHINGTON, DC
Federal investigators have released hundreds of pages of
records that offer new insight into the moments just before and after a 2013
oil train derailment near Casselton, North Dakota, that created a massive fire
and forced 1,400 people to evacuate for several days.
Interviews with the BNSF Railway workers operating the two
trains in the derailment are included in documents the National
Transportation Safety Board posted online Monday. Federal investigators
also said in the documents that a broken train axle found after the derailment
might have been prevented if BNSF railroad had inspected it more carefully and
found a pre-existing flaw.
The broken axel wasn't pinpointed as the cause of the crash,
but the NTSB ordered the industry to recall 43 axles made by Standard Steel in
the same 2002 batch.
Officials have said the accident happened when a westbound
freight train derailed and a portion of it fell onto an adjacent track carrying
the eastbound oil train. Eighteen cars on the 106-car oil train derailed and
several exploded and burned.
In the records released Monday, the two men onboard the BNSF
oil train describe losing sight of the tracks in a cloud of blowing snow
shortly before seeing a derailed grain car lying across the tracks. Emergency
brakes were applied, but the train was still moving 42 mph when it struck the
car.
The 18 tank cars broke open and spilled 400,000 gallons of
crude oil that fueled the fire that could be seen from nearly 10 miles away. It
took several weeks to clean up the remaining oil from the site 30 miles west of
Fargo after the flames were extinguished.
Everyone aboard both trains escaped unharmed. But just a
couple minutes after conductor Pete
Rigpl exited the oil train, he looked back to see flames engulf the
locomotive he and Bryan
Thompson had been in.
"I was exiting the cab then and started to get away
from all the fire. It was — the heat was intense," Rigpl said to
investigators. "I mean, the whole situation just — I was in knee-deep
snow. I couldn't get away as quickly as I would like to."
The two men called 911 and talked with BNSF dispatchers as
they moved away from the growing fire consuming their cargo. Rigpl and Thompson
told investigators they stressed the potential danger as they talked with
emergency responders.
Railroad shipments of crude oil are facing additional
scrutiny and tougher regulations because there have been several fiery
derailments involving the commodity in recent years. The worst happened in July
2013 and killed 47 people in a small Canadian city just across the U.S.-Canada
border from Maine.
Thompson, the oil train's engineer, said that when he heard
people were approaching the derailment to get a glimpse of the wreckage he
urged a sheriff's deputy to remove them because of the danger.
"I don't think he grasped what was going on until I
told him, I said do you know the story of the train in Canada? I said that's
the type of train I am," Thompson said to the NTSB. "And his eyes got
big, you know, then he said Code Red on his radio. I remember that."
BNSF and the other major freight railroads have taken a
number of steps to improve the safety of crude oil shipments, including
reducing speeds in high-risk areas.
BNSF officials did not immediately respond Monday afternoon
to a request for comment about the report.
Federal regulators are expected to release new standards for
the tank cars that carry crude oil and new rules for railroad operations as
soon as next month.
The number of carloads railroads hauled nationwide increased
again last year to 493,126 from 407,761 in 2013. In 2008, before the oil boom
took off in the Bakken region of North Dakota and Montana, as well as in
Canada, railroads hauled just 9,500 carloads of crude oil.
BNSF, which is owned by Omaha-based Berkshire
Hathaway Inc., hauls most of the oil produced in the Bakken region. It is
based in Fort Worth, Texas.