Oops.
A BNSF Railway train loaded with crude oil derailed and caught fire on Thursday afternoon in a rural area south of Galena, Illinois, according to local officials and the company...
Dark smoke was seen for miles around the crash site...
The train with 105 loaded cars - 103 of them carrying crude oil - derailed around 1:20 p.m...
Eight cars derailed, according to Galena City Administrator Mark Moran, six of which had tumbled onto their side...
About 40 to 50 oil trains come through the area each week, Jo Daviess County Emergency Manager Charles Pedersen said.
If planes crashed at the rate these trains are derailing their would be a major Federal investigation and planes under suspicion of faults would be grounded. Yet these trains filled with essentially high-explosives continue to roll through the country, and worse through densely populated areas.
The latest plan for the Bay Area has these bomb trains being sent through the East Bay, from Martinez which is north and east of the East Bay, down through Richmond, Berkeley, Oakland, San Leandro, Hayward, Fremont and San Jose - all major metropolitan areas.
A revised environmental report for a rail expansion project at a petroleum refinery on the Central California coast that could bring crude oil by trains through densely populated East Bay cities like Fremont has been published...
The Phillips 66 Company Rail Spur Extension Project envisions bringing unit trains with 80 tank cars plus locomotives and supporting cars to a new crude oil unloading facility in Santa Maria...
The approach from the south would be through the Los Angeles area and up the Pacific Coast. An approach from the north would go along the Amtrak Capitol Corridor from Martinez via Richmond, Berkeley and Emeryville to Oakland, and from there south along the Capitol Corridor or Coast Starlight route via Hayward, Fremont and Santa Clara to San Jose and on to Santa Maria.
Of course the towns all oppose it.
The latest to register their dislike is San Leandro:
the ((San Leandro)) City Council unanimously approved, without discussion, a resolution asking the Alameda County Board of Supervisors to oppose the expansion of the Phillips 66 facility in San Luis Obispo County.
But there is nothing they can do, legally, to interfere with shipping by rail.
It's only a matter of time until the Lac-Megantic tragedy is repeated here in the US:
In 2013, 47 people were killed in the Quebec town of Lac-Mégantic after a train carrying crude oil derailed and exploded.
Oops indeed.
6:04 PM PT: Some good aerial footage.
6:33 PM PT:
GALENA, Ill. — A woman who lives near the scene of Thursday's train derailment said she heard three explosions and watched smoke billowing for hours as her neighbors were being evacuated.
Several train cars carrying crude oil derailed about 1:20 p.m. several miles south of Galena...
"I seen the explosions, and I heard the explosions," Peggy Hughes said from her home on North Ferry Landing Road, which she said is about a mile from the accident site. "I've been watching it out my window all afternoon. I've never seen anything like it."
...
The derailment is in the area where the Galena River meets the Mississippi River. It's about 80 miles north of the Quad-Cities.
http://qctimes.com/...