When he considers the increase in the movement of oil by rail, Hunter sees it as only a matter of time before a local catastrophe occurs.
“Hopefully not in my lifetime,” he said, “because I really don’t want to see it.”
‘Reportable’ incidents
Clark County has seen major rail accidents before.
In January 1980, for example, a mudslide slammed into the midsection of an 81-car Burlington Northern train moving north of Ridgefield along Lancaster Lake.
Approximately 19 cars derailed, including four locomotives. At least one car leaked anhydrous ammonia. An estimated 500 gallons of diesel fuel gushed from one of the locomotives into the lake.
Ammonia fumes filled the air. Several families were evacuated. Two members of the train’s crew were hospitalized. Several days later, they died. Both had inhaled ammonia fumes.
Often, problems stem from the tracks themselves. As an inspector, Hunter rode in a “high-rail” truck, a vehicle capable of trundling along both rail tracks and roads.
“You’re visually inspecting the track, how it rides,” Hunter said. “You can feel a broken rail when you run over it.”
A track may buckle from heat. It may shrink from cold and, as Hunter put it, “tear itself apart.”
Rail accidents by year in Clark County
2005: 3
2006: 4
2007: 4
2008: 5
2009: 3
2010: 4
2011: 4
2012: 0
2013: 3
2014: 3
TOTAL: 33
Out of the 33 reported rail accidents ...
15 involved cars carrying hazardous material
9 damaged at least one car carrying hazardous materials
1 resulted in a spill of hazardous materials
Bolts go missing. Ties break.
“You fix it physically,” Hunter said, “or put a speed restriction on it.” Or, he added, you take it out of service.
Crumbling tracks aren’t the only potential causes of train accidents.
Tracks curve and dip. The contents of train cars shift. The jostling may rock a train off a track.
Then there’s human error. A person falls asleep, misses a signal. A dispatcher calls it wrong, setting up a head-on collision.
Dangerous at-grade crossings, mudslides, plugged culverts, washouts, broken train wheels — all are also potential factors in train accidents.
Rail oversight mostly falls to federal authorities, and has for decades. Local responders don’t receive direct word of rail incidents unless they need to, said John Wheeler, emergency management coordinator at the Clark Regional Emergency Services Agency. If it’s significant enough, they’ll be notified through 911 calls, he said.
“It’s really going to depend on the severity of the incident,” Wheeler said. “We’re not a regulatory agency.”
CRESA does receive mandatory reports of hazardous material spills, but that requirement only applies to facilities — “in other words, not moving,” Wheeler said. “That’s not going to capture trains.”
At the state level, lawmakers and officials have called for railroads to be more forthcoming about what they carry so emergency responders can be better prepared for a possible disaster. Pressure increased as the number of oil trains climbed. BNSF and other railroads reluctantly began providing more detailed oil train counts and route information last year.
Even as BNSF has come under fire at times for its lack of transparency, it has stressed its commitment to safety. The rise of oil by rail may have raised the stakes.
“It just makes safety that much more important,” Melonas said. “And all eyes are on oil trains 24/7.”
Oil: ‘Risk is here now’
The conversation around rail safety reached a turning point on July 6, 2013. That’s the day a runaway oil train derailed and exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, killing 47 people and leveling part of the town.
It remains the worst oil train disaster to date, but it wasn’t the last. Public concern has intensified as additional derailments and explosions have grabbed national headlines.
Reported rail accidents in Clark County, 2005-2014
• Feb. 10, 2005: Track welder rocked off track.
• March 14, 2005: Collision and derailment caused by failure to apply hand brakes on cars.
• June 13, 2005: One train raked another in Vancouver yard.
• Jan. 12, 2006: Train struck a truck at gated railroad crossing.
• April 5, 2006: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Oct. 10, 2006: Side collision in Vancouver yard; 300 gallons of diesel released.
• Dec. 3, 2006: Derailment caused by improperly lined switch.
• Feb. 24, 2007: Sideswipe collision of cars at industrial track.
• March 26, 2007: Derailment on main line caused by equipment.
• May 28, 2007: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Nov. 2, 2007: Derailment in Vancouver yard caused by broken rail.
• March 29, 2008: Cars shoved into each other on industrial track.
• July 26, 2008: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• July 28, 2008: Freight train derailment in Vancouver yard; damage totals $258,000.
• Aug. 22, 2008: Derailment on main line.
• Nov. 22, 2008: Derailment on main line caused by equipment failure.
• June 1, 2009: Collision and derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Nov. 16, 2009: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Dec. 10, 2009: Damaged locomotive arrives in Vancouver.
• June 27, 2010: Sideswipe collision in Vancouver yard.
• Aug. 12, 2010: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Aug. 31, 2010: Cars damaged on industrial track.
• Dec. 10, 2010: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Jan. 4, 2011: Side collision and derailment in Vancouver yard.
• April 14, 2011: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• May 13, 2011: Derailment in Vancouver yard.
• Dec. 24, 2011: Derailment of train leaving Vancouver yard.
• Jan. 4, 2013: Single-car collision in Vancouver yard.
• Jan. 6, 2013: Derailment on industrial track.
• Dec. 20, 2013: Derailment on main line near Ridgefield caused by equipment failure.
• June 27, 2014: Raking collision and derailment of single car in Vancouver yard.
• Sept. 13, 2014: Collision in Vancouver yard.
• Dec. 9, 2014: Track and signal damage found in Vancouver yard.
Source: Federal Railroad Administration
The U.S. Department of Transportation recently predicted that trains hauling crude oil or ethanol will derail an average of 10 times per year over the next two decades, causing more than $4 billion in damage and possibly killing hundreds of people if an accident occurs in a densely populated part of the U.S.
The prediction came just a week after an oil train derailment in West Virginia. Less than a month later, another train hauling crude derailed and burst into flames in Galena, Ill.
Local and state governments, meanwhile, are grappling with how to respond to public concerns.
In Olympia, state lawmakers have floated multiple bills aimed at boosting the safety of transporting crude by rail.
In Vancouver, the city council adopted a resolution opposing the rail-to-marine oil transfer terminal proposed by Tesoro Corp. and Savage Companies at the Port of Vancouver. The city has also imposed a ban on new oil-by-rail facilities, but the moratorium doesn’t apply to the Tesoro-Savage terminal or a separate, smaller proposal by NuStar Energy. Both were already in the works when the council took action.
The Tesoro-Savage venture, known as Vancouver Energy, would handle an average of 360,000 barrels of crude per day, making it the largest oil-by-rail facility in the United States. The terminal would more than double the number of oil trains now rolling through Clark County every day. Currently, two to three oil trains daily travel through the county on the way to facilities elsewhere.
At least initially, Tesoro would own and deliver much of the oil to the Vancouver Energy terminal. The company has pledged to use a newer tank car model known as the CPC-1232, “or better.” The design is considered an improvement over the older DOT-111 model.
But the National Transportation Safety Board says the CPC-1232 design fails to offer significant safety improvements. Indeed, several of the recent oil train disasters involved CPC-1232 rail cars.
Still, Vancouver Energy remains committed to the CPC-1232 cars, said Dan Riley, vice president for state and local government affairs with Tesoro. But the company is closely monitoring federal rules, which could result in an entirely new tank car model, he said.
“We will only accept what the regulations require or better,” Riley said.
Tesoro has operated other oil transfer terminals, but nothing on the scale of what’s proposed in Vancouver. The company’s refineries include a facility in Anacortes that began receiving Bakken crude oil from North Dakota in 2012, according to the state Department of Ecology. Bakken oil is the same type of crude — considered highly volatile — that would go to the Vancouver terminal, and already travels through Clark County daily.
Once operational, Vancouver Energy will be “manned 24/7,” Riley said. A 5 mph speed limit on oil trains in the terminal is among the safety measures that aim to prevent any kind of spill or incident, he said.
“We will operate under the premise that all accidents are preventable,” Riley said. “We will train our workers so that we can accomplish that.”
Critics aren’t convinced.
The facility has led some observers to call Vancouver the epicenter of the national debate over oil trains and rail safety. U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., is among those leading the charge on tightening standards for tank cars and the volatility of crude oil transported by rail. During a visit to Vancouver earlier this month, Cantwell evoked the Lac-Mégantic disaster that remains a common reference point almost two years later.
“If that happened in Vancouver, the effects would be catastrophic,” Cantwell said recently, standing in an east Vancouver fire station. “An incident of this type would impact thousands of residents. … We can’t continue to put our communities at risk.”
As the senator spoke, Vancouver Fire Chief Joe Molina and other local officials watched nearby. At one point, Molina was asked about seeing oil trains roll through the city — and right past City Hall — on a daily basis.
The fire chief answered matter-of-factly:
“The risk is here now.”