LASALLE, Colo. (AP) — Crews from Union Pacific Railroad worked to clear a six-car oil train derailment that leaked some crude into a ditch Friday in northern Colorado.
State and local emergency officials determined that one car of the 100-car train was leaking after the 8 a.m. derailment near LaSalle, about 45 miles north of Denver.
The cause of the derailment was under investigation, said Micki Trost, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Division of Emergency Management. Crews had contained the spill to a ditch away from any waterways, Trost said.
The amount of oil spilled wasn’t immediately known, but a vacuum truck was brought in to suck up the spill. Tanker trucks lined up nearby to transfer the oil.
According to The Greeley Tribune (http://tinyurl.com/m96ows9 ), the train was loaded in nearby Windsor with Niobrara crude and was bound for New York. Niobrara oil comes from the Niobrara shale formation in Colorado, Wyoming and Kansas. It’s not considered as volatile as Bakken crude from North Dakota and eastern Montana.
Information from: The Tribune of Greeley, Co, http://greeleytribune.com
This is amazing, flying right under the radar… wow
I must have the Monday Densities - flying under what radar and can you explain a little more of what you are thinking?
Thanx
It didn’t burn, and it was not Bakken, so apparently not newsworthy beyond the local area…
Also there’s no big public hullabaloo about building a pipeline for Niobrara oil…
Chuck
Oil trains drailing left and right…
What—is—going—on???
They aren’t derailing right and left. The few derailments that have happened are not an abnormal frequency. The derailments have all been different causes on different railroads. The common thread is the commodity, its newsworthiness, and the type of car involved. The non-CBR derailments don’t get multi-page forum threads and spots on the evening news.
Back when the UP had problems and was the punching bag, they had a relatively minor derailment of a grain train on an industry lead in California and it made the national news three days in a row. During that same time the BNSF had a rear end collision with fatalities in Oklahoma and not a peep was said on the news. But the UP was out of favor with the news media and public so it got the coverage while the BNSF incident was ignored.
Anything CBR will be a “big deal” now and stick in people’s memories just like LPG accidents were in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. That was fixed by changing the car design and it became a non-event, much like the CBR solution is a change in car design to make it a non-event. (Just to be clear, regardless of the media coverage a railroad considers any derailment of any hazmat to be a bad thing and any release of hazmat to be a very bad thing.)
OK, good explanation, one that makes sense.
I would point out that since oil-by-rail shipments are under a magnifying glass for the forseeable future the railroads have to be VERY careful. Maybe shorter train lengths are in order, maybe closer than normal track inspections on the various routes. Anything to stop the media circus.
Keep in mind that, God help us, at least a third of the people in this country aren’t happy unless they’re terrified of SOMETHING, and there’s too many others out there all to eager to fuel the fear, for various reasons.