Lac-Mégantic railway accident

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Burning downtown of Lac-Mégantic

The Lac-Mégantic railway accident occurred in the small town of Lac-Mégantic in the Canadian province of Québec when a driverless freight train of the Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway (MMA) on the Brookport – Mattawamkeag line was on July 6, 2013 at around 1:15 a.m. derailed. The train transporting crude oil from North Dakota to a refinery of Irving Oil in New Brunswick . Some of the crude oil leaking from the destroyed tank wagons caught fire in an explosive manner , killing at least 47 people and destroying 40 buildings.

Starting position

The train drove eleven kilometers driverless from Nantes to Lac-Mégantic
Scene of the accident and affected area

The MMA 2 freight train loaded with crude oil was traveling east from Montreal to Saint John (New Brunswick) . Five diesel locomotives pulled the long 1,433 meters and 9,330 tons of heavy train . A freight train escort car with a radio remote control receiver was lined up between the first and second locomotives . Behind the locomotives there was a box car as a protective car and the 72 tank cars. The tank cars were an older variant of the so-called 111 series , a North American standard tank car series for the transport of non-pressurized liquids. They were each filled with 113,000 liters (approx. 25,000 Imp.gal. ) Of crude oil. Because of their thinner walls, the tank wagons are more sensitive to accidents than more modern vehicles with thicker walls, but were still in operation in 2013 and made up over 70% of the North American tanker truck fleet.

On July 5, 2013, around 11 p.m. EST , the train stopped in Nantes , where the driver left the train to stay overnight. Since the overtaking track, which was secured by a safety switch , was occupied by another train as planned, he parked his train on the continuous main track, which had a gradient of 12 per thousand. He switched off four of the five locomotives , the leading locomotive remained in operation to supply the air brakes of the train. According to MMA, he also pulled the hand brakes on the five locomotives and ten other cars , but did not properly perform the handbrake effectiveness test. Contrary to the regulations, he only released the automatic brake of the train, but not the direct brake of the locomotives, in order to determine whether the train could be held on the slope by the hand brakes. The train was unguarded and the locomotives were unlocked while the driver was in the hotel.

At 11:50 p.m. a resident of Nantes reported a fire that had broken out on the locomotive that was in operation. The arriving local fire brigade activated the emergency fuel cut-off and switched off all circuit breakers in the rear wall of the driver's cab to avoid sources of ignition . At first the dispatcher could not reach a train driver or mechanic, which is why he sent a track construction foreman to the train. After the train driver had been informed of the fire, he asked the dispatcher if he should go to Nantes to start another locomotive. He said no and said that the track construction master was already on his way to the train and that the locomotives should not be started until the next morning.

After the fire brigade and the track construction manager had established that the fire had been extinguished and all locomotives had been switched off, everyone involved left the place and left the train unguarded again. None of those involved thought of restarting a locomotive to keep the air brakes operational.

Cause of fire: diesel locomotive
The fire in the leading diesel locomotive was caused by an inadequate repair of a camshaft bearing in the engine. After the outer ring of the bearing broke because the screws were too tight , it was temporarily sealed with a polymer adhesive. The bearing could not withstand the mechanical stresses, so it failed. This caused an insufficient supply of lubricant to the valves of the corresponding cylinder, which in turn led to overheating of the valves and probably to holes in the piston crown . This allowed lubricant to get out of the oil sump into the intake and exhaust channels . Some of it collected in the turbocharger housing and ignited.

the accident

The hand brakes weren't enough to hold the weight of the train against the slope. The driverless train started moving on the inclined route at around 00:56 a.m. and derailed after 11 kilometers in the small town of Lac-Mégantic, 100 meters below, when it made a sharp curve there, which for a top speed of only 16 km / h ( 10 mph), drove through at around 100 km / h after a level crossing at the northern entrance to the station. The five locomotives were separated from the train and only came to a stop 800 meters further east. 63 tank wagons and the protection wagon derailed, partially tipping over and being pushed into one another. Only the last nine cars remained on the track.

Leaking oil caught fire and initially flowed into the village at the speed of the train, also burning into the sewer system, where it spread and emerged from sewer openings in other parts of the city as a flame. It set fire to numerous buildings where residents slept. Some of the tank cars exploded. The nine tank wagons that had not derailed at the end of the train were pulled away by railway workers before they could catch fire. About 120 firefighters from Lac-Mégantic, neighboring towns, including the United States , fought the fire, which could only be extinguished after more than 48 hours.

consequences

42 bodies were recovered, 34 of which could be identified immediately. Another five people remained missing. It is believed that they burned to the point that there are no identifiable remains of them. The confirmed number of deaths was put on July 26, 2013 at 47.

Around 30 buildings in the city ​​center were destroyed and 2,000 residents were temporarily evacuated. After about 100,000 liters of crude oil flowed into the Rivière Chaudière , an oil spill threatened .

The Prime Minister of Québec, Pauline Marois , visited the place on the day of the disaster. The following day, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper also visited Lac-Mégantic.

The Canadian Transportation Safety Board of Canada issued two safety notices for railway companies on July 19, 2013:

  • On the one hand, it recommends that trains carrying dangerous goods should not be parked unguarded on the main track.
  • On the other hand, a safety guideline is to be revised, which deals with the application of hand brakes on unguarded trains after it has been determined that the braking force applied to the accident freight train was too low to prevent it from rolling away. So far, it is at the discretion of the locomotive staff to determine the necessary braking force and the resulting number of hand brakes to be applied.

The cost of repairing the damage on the two square kilometers affected area by the city of Lac-Mégantic amounted to 8 million CAD . Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway (MMA) estimated the total damage to be CAD 200 million (EUR 144 million). As a result, MMA's liabilities exceeded its fixed assets, causing both Canadian (Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Canada Co. - MMA Canada) and U.S. (Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway, Ltd. - MMAR) registered railroad companies on August 7, 2013 had to file for bankruptcy. Since MMA's liability insurance only covers damage up to CAD 25 million, the Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA) revoked the license in Canada for the two MMA companies with effect from August 20, 2013.

Accident processing

By evaluating the tachograph , the TSB hoped to gain further information on how this accident could have happened.

In the period between November 2012 and July 2013, the Canadian oil company Irving Oil was able to prove 34 violations of the dangerous goods transport law in the transport of crude oil, which are punishable as criminal offenses. In the present case, the transported crude oil was not labeled as dangerous goods , which violated the applicable safety regulations. In late October 2017, Irving Oil was fined four million Canadian dollars as a result . Most of the money will go to research programs on transport security. The company wants to train its employees better in handling the transport of dangerous goods.

On October 2, 2017, the process against the train driver, the dispatcher and the superior operations director of the former MMA for criminal negligence in 47 cases was opened before a 12-person jury in Sherbrooke . After the prosecution gave the indictment, with 31 witnesses speaking, the defense asserted on December 12, 2017 that the prosecution had not adequately explained the guilt of the defendants and decided not to call the defense witnesses. The proceedings were then postponed until January 3, 2018. On January 19, 2018, the jury acquitted the defendants after nine days of deliberation.

In October 2019, a project to bypass Lac-Mégantic on a 12.8 kilometer new line was presented. Construction is scheduled to start in 2020.

See also

Web links

Commons : Lac-Mégantic railway accident  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
 Wikinews: Canada: Devastation in Small Town After Oil Train Derailed  - News
 Wikinews: Who is to blame for the train accident in Lac-Mégantic?  - message

Remarks

  1. ↑ In German law, this corresponds roughly to negligent homicide .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Accident au Canada: le Saint-Laurent menacé, possible explication. AFP, accessed July 9, 2013 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e f Railway investigation R13D0054 - Major rail accident in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec. Transportation Safety Board of Canada , July 19, 2013, accessed July 20, 2013 .
  3. ↑ Safety rules lag as oil transport by train rises. In: CBC News. July 9, 2013, accessed March 12, 2017 .
  4. ^ Lac-Mégantic: la sécurité du type de wagons déjà mise en cause. In: Radio Canada , July 8, 2013.
  5. ↑ Lac-Mégantic: la compagnie évoque le système de freinage à air. In: Radio Canada, July 7, 2013.
  6. ^ Anne-Lovely Étienne, Sarah Bélisle: Explosion Lac-Mégantic: Employé de la MMA Lac-Mégantic: conducteur muet. In: Le Journal de Montréal , July 8, 2013.
  7. ↑ a b c Securement of equipment and trains left unattended. In: Rail Safety Advisory Letter - 09/13. Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB), July 18, 2013, accessed July 23, 2013 .
  8. ^ So Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway (MMA) (ed.): Derailment in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec ( Memento of July 8, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 48 kB). Press release, July 7, 2013.
  9. ^ TSB investigators lay out timeline of Lac-Mégantic disaster . In: CBC-news, July 9, 2013.
  10. ^ Graeme Hamilton: Police launch 'unprecedented criminal investigation' into Lac-Mégantic train disaster . In: National Post , July 9, 2013.
  11. ↑ a b Derailment in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec (press release). (PDF; 76 kB) Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway (MMA), July 6, 2013, archived from the original on October 29, 2013 ; accessed on July 7, 2013 .
  12. ↑ train disaster in Canada: The mysterious inferno of Lac-Mégantic. In: Spiegel Online . July 7, 2013, accessed July 7, 2013 .
  13. ^ Lac-Mégantic: trois nouvelles victimes identifiées . In: Radio Canada, July 26, 2013.
  14. ↑ Train accident in Lac-Mégantic - Investigators check criminal background. In: Süddeutsche.de. July 10, 2013, accessed July 10, 2013 .
  15. ↑ Safety advisory letter to Transport Canada on the securement of unattended locomotives. In: Rail Safety Advisory Letter - 08/13. Transportation Safety Board of Canada (TSB), July 19, 2013, accessed July 23, 2013 .
  16. ↑ Canada: Accident train company MMA under bankruptcy protection - were hand brakes applied? Eurailpress, August 12, 2013, accessed August 13, 2013 .
  17. ^ Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Files for Bankruptcy In Canada & the US (press release). (PDF; 92 kB) Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway (MMA), August 7, 2013, archived from the original on August 10, 2013 ; accessed on August 9, 2013 .
  18. ^ David Ljunggren: Canada to shut down rail firm involved in Quebec town disaster. Reuters, August 13, 2013, accessed August 14, 2013 .
  19. ↑ Canada: Oil company fined CAD 4 million for the Lac-Mégantic accident. In: Locomotive Report . October 27, 2017. Retrieved November 5, 2017 .
  20. ↑ Canada: Trial against three railway workers for the accident in Lac-Mégantic is open. In: Locomotive Report . October 3, 2017, accessed November 5, 2017 .
  21. ^ NN: Trial underway for ex-railway employees charged in Lac-Megantic train disaster . In: Hamilton Spectator of October 2, 2017; accessed on January 26, 2018.
  22. ↑ Alison Brunette: 3 former MMA rail workers acquitted in Lac-Mégantic disaster trial . In: CBC News of January 19, 2018; accessed on January 26, 2018.
  23. ↑ Canada: Lac-Mégantic accident site is to be bypassed (source: Radio Canada, BAPE, Journal de Montréal). Locomotive Report , November 1, 2019, accessed on November 23, 2019 .

Coordinates: 45 ° 34 ′ 40 ″  N , 70 ° 53 ′ 6 ″  W.