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U.S. Seeks to Improve Hazardous Rail Shipment Information Flow, Researches Structure of Tankers By Joe Fiorill WASHINGTON — The United States is seeking to improve emergency responders’ access to information about hazardous materials on their regions’ rails, as well as its understanding of the structure and behavior of rail tankers, according to a plan the Transportation Department released yesterday (see GSN, April 20). The plan’s release follows a January chlorine-tanker accident in Graniteville, S.C., that left nine people dead and comes amid efforts by Washington and other cities to limit hazardous rail shipments in their jurisdictions. A key legal underpinning of Washington’s bid, which a federal appeals court halted this month by granting an injunction requested by rail operator CSX, has been the premise that the U.S. government has failed to address the threat represented by rail tankers containing chlorine gas and other materials historically used as chemical weapons. “The rail industry transports roughly 1.7 million shipments of hazardous materials annually, ordinarily without incident, but the Graniteville accident demonstrates the devastating consequences when something does go wrong,” Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta said yesterday as he announced the safety plan in Columbia, S.C. The department’s Federal Railroad Administration has asked the Association of American Railroads, an industry group, to implement a new system in which emergency responders can receive immediate notification of derailments detected by rail companies and download information about train contents from a secure Internet site. The railroad agency is also conducting new research on the structure of rail cars and their behavior during derailments and other incidents, with an eye toward improving the structural integrity of tank cars, according to the plan. The plan indicates the steps are being taken despite good performance to date by the industry. “Generally, the rail industry’s record on transporting hazardous materials is very impressive,” it reads. “During the period 1994 through 2004, a total of nine fatalities resulted from the release of hazardous materials in train accidents.” District of Columbia Council member Kathy Patterson said today that the new federal plan does not address the central concerns of the council, which fears terrorists could attack a chlorine tanker and release a massive chlorine cloud causing thousands of deaths. “It doesn’t address the risks of terrorism. It doesn’t address the risks of a deliberate attack on hazardous cargo,” said Patterson, a chief sponsor of the Washington ban legislation. Patterson said “it was good to see” the government’s request for rail companies to provide more information to local response agencies. She praised the new research into tanker structure as well but added, “There are a lot of things that there is technology to do today that they haven’t required the railroads to do.” A spokeswoman for CSX, the primary target of the Washington ban, said the company “shares the secretary’s commitment to rail safety,” is “focused on improving all aspects of rail safety” and has “worked closely with the DOT and its agencies in that regard.” “CSX transported more than 518,000 carloads of hazardous materials in 2004 with a 99.99 percent safety record,” spokeswoman Misty Skipper said today, “and we are certainly striving to make that 100 percent.”
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