Short-hauler doesn’t carry dangerous goods on PA rails

“We’re not handling unit trains of crude or any of that,” Brade said. The business of storing these cars has also dropped off.

It was full crude oil tankers that rolled away, out of control and derailed in Lac-Mégantic, Que., on July 6. The fuel cargo in the runaway train caused an explosion, which resulted in the deaths of at least 42 people in the town.

Transport Canada, the federal regulatory body that sets out the rules governing the transportation of dangerous goods, announced a number of ‘emergency’ changes aimed at enhancing rail safety.

Among those new guidelines, rail operators now have to ensure no locomotive or car carrying dangerous goods is left unattended on the track and that trains carrying one or more cars with dangerous goods have no fewer than two qualified people on the main track or sidings.

Carlton Trail’s trains are all manned by two man crews, Brade said. This is the case with all of the crews operating Omnitrax-owned trains in Canada.

“So you have a locomotive engineer and a conductor,” he said. “Our handbrake policy is anything that’s left unattended has 10 per cent hand brakes plus one. So, if you had a single car, it’d be a hand brake, if you had two cars left, it’d be two hand brakes. Three cars would probably be two hand brakes. If you had 100 cars, there’d be 11 hand brakes applied.”

Brade called the company’s hand brake policy “fairly restrictive” as compared to the industry standard. It’s also the company’s policy not to leave trains unattended on the main track.

Rail companies are also required to file safety management system (SMS) plans with provinces annually. In the SMS, the railway would include information about efficiency testing, areas of concern and risk management. The plans have to comply with federal railway operating rules.

Efficiency testing involves observing and evaluating employees, while risk management involves incident reporting, associated risk profiles and managing risk profiles.

Omnitrax subjects its employees to efficiency inspections, annual on-site audits by senior managers. As well, Carlton Trail Railway has safety committees that meet once a month.

The railways also have to have an emergency response plan.

“CTR [Carlton Trail Railway] hasn’t had a derailment in a long time. So, at least two, three years, we haven’t seen anything that’s been reportable,” Brade said.

Company-wide, it has had 0.70 incidents per 200,000 man hours. Carlton Trail Railway had zero incidents per 200,000 man hours.

“So, [the] normal industry standard is double or triple that,” Brade said.

Carlton Trail Railway is the main operator that uses the tracks that go through Prince Albert. It’s a short-haul railway that’s governed by a complicated web of regulations. It must follow federal dangerous good statutes and operating rules for crew requirements, for example, but its rail operations are governed by the province.

“We make sure that the rail lines have the proper emergency policies in place and safety policies. But a lot of the standards we go along with are following the same essential rules and requirements that the federal railways have, like CN and CP,” ministry of highways spokesman Joel Cherry said on Tuesday.

Cherry said the ministry has inspectors and it works with the Saskatchewan Shortline Railway Association to make sure everything is running up to code.

Provincially, Cherry said there haven’t been any incidents involving dangerous goods on Saskatchewan short-line tracks. Only four short-line operators in the province carry crude oil – Great Western, Stewart Southern, Long Creek Railroad and Big Sky Rail.

While Carlton Trail Railway has stated openly that it does not carry dangerous goods on its lines, railways are not required to tell communities that they are shipping such goods through that community.

Federally, the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act of 1992 does not require companies to disclose that information to communities.

“They basically have to have their books in order for when Transport Canada people will go and check their books,” Transport Canada spokeswoman Maryse Durette said via telephone on Tuesday.

Operators can transport dangerous goods anywhere, at any time and don’t have to declare it to anyone, she confirmed.

She said the operators do not have to submit a list of what they are transporting – they just need to follow the rules and fully comply when they are being inspected.

“However, Industry Associations have in place programs that work with communities regarding the products being manufactured and transported through a community. One example of such a program is the Chemical Industry of Canada’s Responsible Care program,” Durette wrote in an email on Monday.

However, Brade said that what Omnitrax railways do every year is give local fire departments an understanding of what’s being handled on the railroad.

“It’s an annual touch point. We don’t reach out to communities every time a train is coming through town.”

tjames@panow.com

On Twitter: @thiajames

by Thia James

Short-hauler doesn’t carry dangerous goods on PA rails

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