Train Deaths Rise Amid Energy-Driven Rail Transformation

Train Deaths Rise Amid Energy-Driven Rail Transformation 

Fatalities reach seven-year high as railroads embark on a record expansion 

By Marianne Lavelle and Daily Climate | March 16, 2015  Scientific American
This article is from the In-Depth Report Train Tragedies and Transformations

Every week in the United States in 2014, about 16 people were killed by trains—a 17 percent increase over the previous year and adding up to the highest number of rail casualties since 2007, federal government data shows.  

None of these victims died in fiery crude oil explosions like the ones visible for miles around train derailment sites this month in Illinois and Ontario. But in some regions, there are signs that the increasing deaths may be tied to a massive energy-driven transformation underway on U.S. railroads. (See sidebar, "Five ways energy is driving new railroad traffic.")

As the tracks become major conduits for oil, petroleum products, and—not as widely noticed—materials like industrial sand, pipe, and chemicals for the hydraulic fracturing of oil and natural gas wells, some states are grappling with changed train routes, speeds and traffic patterns that spell new hazards for pedestrians and motorists.

Ready for expansion?
Adding to risk are surging U.S. passenger railroads, which typically operate on the same tracks as freight. The number of people struck and killed by passenger trains last year, about 255, was the highest toll of non-passenger fatalities for those railroads in 40 years of record-keeping by the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Railroad Administration (FRA).

The increase in fatalities raises questions whether the nation is prepared for the massive rail expansion already underway. Railroads plan record capital spending of $29 billion this year. They'll lay new track, double existing track, buy locomotives and build terminals.

But the one job that won't get done is installation of a new high-tech integrated command and control safety system, Positive Train Control (PTC), even though Congress seven years ago mandated its deployment by the end of 2015. A bipartisan bill already has been introduced to extend the safety system deadline five more years. (See sidebar.)

The most populous states had the greatest number of train fatalities. California, with 141 deaths, and Texas, with 65, together accounted for 25 percent of the total. California was one of the few places that the majority of fatalities were due to passenger trains. Across the country, 70 percent of those who died on railroads in 2014, some 575 people, were killed by freight trains.

Freight rail traffic increased 4.5 percent last year, a substantial bump after two prior years of declining carloads. That drop-off was due mainly to falling demand for rail's longtime mainstay commodity—coal. But freight rebounded due to strong shipping of consumer goods and its single fastest-growing commodity, crude oil, up 20.1 percent over 2013 to 493,126 carloads in 2014, the Association of American Railroads reported.....   more here

Train derailments: often a failure to see and fix track defects

Investigators gather Friday, May 8, 2015, at the site of the oil train derailment and fire near Heimdal, N.D.

Train derailments: Looking at track defects

In derailments, often a failure to see and fix internal track defects

 

May 10, 2015   By Daniel Moore / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

On a snowy morning in February 2014, a Norfolk Southern freight train snaked east through rural Westmoreland County with 83 of its cars loaded with crude oil.

It was cruising at about 30 mph near Vandergrift when it hit a section of track where the rail was slightly too far apart. The spikes designed to hold the rails in place were missing or defective, according to preliminary company-reported federal data. 

The train derailed, violently tossing 21 cars — 19 carrying crude oil, two carrying propane — from the tracks. The force punctured four cars and spilled 4,300 gallons of oil across the banks of the Kiskiminetas River.

All told, Pennsylvania’s largest crude oil spill since 1990 caused more than $2 million in damage....

...The U.S. Department of Transportation in April released long-anticipated rules that would phase out older tank cars and require electronically controlled brakes for trains carrying crude oil and ethanol.

Largely escaping scrutiny, however, has been a key factor in derailments and one almost exclusively outside government control: the track itself. Track defects are the leading cause of derailments and internal rail flaws account for the most damaging of them, according to an analysis of government data and academic reports. Those tasked with identifying and fixing track flaws say more needs to be done to improve track inspection, including more frequent checks.

But with the rise in crude shipments by rail has come added pressure on company-employed inspectors who are — much like construction workers on a busy highway — disruptors of traffic. 

Richard Inclima has been focused on the issue of rail inspections for years, pushing in countless negotiations, testimonies and meetings for more federal oversight. 

“The key to this whole puzzle is keeping the trains upright and on the track, and nobody in this country is talking about the foundation of the railroad,” said Mr. Inclima, a former track inspector in New England and the longtime director of safety and education for the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees, a union representing company-employed track inspectors....

Incipient flaws

Despite the spate of high-profile derailments, the 140,000-mile U.S. freight railroad system statistically is safer than it’s ever been, thanks largely to the rapid development of better inspection practices and technology. 

Derailment rates nationwide have dramatically decreased since the 1980s, and government data last month confirmed 2014 was the safest year on record. The track-caused accident rate last year has more than halved since 2000. 

Still, there were nearly 9,000 derailments on U.S. railroads in the last 10 years totaling nearly $2 billion in damage. 

And on Pennsylvania’s more than 5,000 miles of track, about 300 freight trains have derailed during that same time, causing more than $31 million in damage.

More than half of those derailments were caused by track defects, according to a Post-Gazette analysis of accident data collected by the Federal Railroad Administration, an arm of the U.S. Department of Transportation. About 24 percent were attributed to human error, and the rest were listed as a result of equipment, systems and miscellaneous failures.

The Federal Railroad Administration employs roughly six dozen track inspectors — enough to inspect less than 1 percent of track — and it expects 30 percent of its field safety staff to retire in the next few years, according to a 2013 report from the Government Accountability Office. Though all track is subject to the agency’s regulation, its oversight in the field, the report suggested, amounts to little more than cursory checks for compliance and civil penalties for only the most serious of offenses.

This has left an estimated 2,500 inspectors employed by large rail companies as the gatekeepers of rail safety......   more here

Track was inspected day before derailment, FRA says

By Mike Nowatzki / Forum News Service       May 8, 2015

 

HEIMDAL, N.D.—Railroad tracks where an oil train derailed Wednesday in central North Dakota had been inspected by BNSF Railway a day earlier and by the Federal Railroad Administration about three months before the fiery derailment, an FRA spokesman said Friday.

 

"Neither of those inspections noted any defects or violations," Kevin Thompson said.....   more here