Highway 16 reopens after oil car derailment, fire

Highway 16 is once again open to traffic.

It had still been closed as of Tuesday morning, more than 30 hours after a CP Rail train derailment led to oil cars catching fire near Guernsey.

CP said 34 cars went off the track and the line reopened Tuesday morning after repairs and inspections were completed.

An email from the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency (SPAS) on Tuesday afternoon said the scene is now contained, and there is no immediate risk to the public. A crew of 100 responders continues to focus on suppression of the remaining fires.

The Transportation Safety Board (TSB) is now on the site and gathering evidence to determine what caused the derailment. The TSB told 650 CKOM that the investigators now have access to the rail line.

The initial derailment happened just after midnight Monday morning, when a train hauling oil cars left the tracks just west of Guernsey. The derailment led to the cars catching fire, pouring thick, black smoke onto Highway 16.

A semi driver who ended up driving into the smoke said it was so thick he had to wait for firefighters to help him out of it — leaving him covered head-to-toe in heavy, black soot.

One home near the blaze was evacuated as a precaution, according to the province.

An early morning scare for a nearby family

It has been a “pretty hectic” few days for a family living near the derailment.

The site of the derailment, smoke, and subsequent fire is just down Melanie Loessl’s driveway.

She said her family left their home at 4 a.m. Monday, returning at 10:30 a.m. due to concerns about the chemicals being used on the overturned railcars.

Loessl joined Gormley on Tuesday morning, and she explained some of the sounds coming from the site yesterday.

“You could hear it hissing,” she said. “You could hear banging noises from the cars when they were starting to catch on fire. Actually, it sounded like a train going down the tracks.”

Loessl said the fire crews woke them up just before 2 a.m. Monday with the news of the derailment.

Their family didn’t hear the sound of the actual derailment, something she attributes to living so close to the tracks.

Loessl said workers disconnected the other railcars that weren’t turned over Monday, as they were “starting to explode.”

On Tuesday morning, Loessl said they were still seeing the effects of the blaze.

“There is still a lot of smoke out there,” she said. “The smoke is starting to go towards the east, and there was still flames there this morning. I could see from the dark.”

Loessl took the time to thank the fire crews and workers around the derailment who have worked to contain the site, and get things back to operational around her yard.

“It’s freezing cold out, and they have been working endless hours to try and clean it up,” Loessl said.

Provincial Public Safety Agency on scene

Marlo Pritchard, the president of the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency, confirmed that members of the unit responded to the derailment, but he didn’t have any details of what caused it or how many railcars were on fire.

He did say that 34 cars derailed, though he didn’t know how many total cars were part of the train.

Pritchard also said that about 100 first responders are still on scene trying to suppress the flames from the burning cars. Some of the cars have been removed from the derailment site, but he didn’t know how many.

He added that the public safety risk caused by the smoke plume of the burning oil cars is no longer an issue.

The area impacted by the derailment is about five to 10 acres, according to the safety agency. By comparison 7.5 acres is 5 1/2 times bigger than an American football field.

Asked about his concern that such a derailment and fire could happen in larger urban centres like downtown Regina or Saskatoon’s Sunderland region, Pritchard said: “Our role is around public safety. We work with CP Rail. You’ll have to ask CP Rail those questions directly, but they have a huge safety program in place and we will respond to wherever these incidents happen.”

— With files from 650 CKOM’s Brent Bosker and 980 CJME’s Evan Radford