A commodities handler works between two rail tank cars in Underwood, N.D. Federal regulators were accused Wednesday of dragging their feet in mandating safety improvements to the rail tanker car known as the DOT-111. Bloomberg file
The head of a rail safety group compared a widely used train tank car to the recalled Ford Pinto in urging U.S. regulators to require upgrades that would prevent accidents like a Quebec derailment that killed 47 people on July 6.
Karen Darch, the co-chairman of a coalition of communities around Chicago formed in response to a merger of railroads, said Wednesday that regulators dragged their feet in mandating safety improvements to the car, known as the DOT-111, amid evidence showing the tankers are more prone to rupture in a derailment than other types.
"Unfortunately, your combined track record has been less than stellar when it comes to improving the crash-worthiness of the DOT-111 tank car - the primary car used in the transport of dangerous hazmat like crude and ethanol in this country and in Canada," Darch, mayor of Barrington, Ill., told a panel of Federal Railroad Administration and Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration officials.
Regulators had known since 1991 that the rail car has "a high propensity to rupture in derailment scenarios," she said in comparing it to Ford Motor Co.'s Pinto, which in the 1970s was recalled amid questions that a flawed fuel tank would catch fire in a rear-end collision.
Cheryl Burke, a rail safety executive for Dow Chemical Co. in Midland, Mich., said retrofitting all DOT-111s in use was "impractical if not impossible."
While she said Dow supports efforts to make rail transport safe, tank cars can't be expected to be "completely impervious to the substantial forces that occur in significant rail accidents, particularly high-speed derailments."
Deborah Hersman, the chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said in a 2012 letter to regulators that the DOT-111 had a "high incidence of tank failures during accidents."
According to the NTSB, about 69 percent of the U.S. rail tank car fleet are DOT-111s. A Canadian Senate committee said in a report this month the government should consider accelerating the phaseout of tank cars.
U.S. regulators are reviewing safety rules for transporting hazardous materials in response to the July 6 train derailment and explosion in Lac-Megantic, Quebec. Some of the 72 cars, which were carrying crude from North Dakota's Bakken formation to a New Brunswick refinery, were DOT-111s.
U.S. and Canadian regulators this month imposed emergency rules designed to prevent trains that are parked and unattended from rolling free. The Federal Railroad Administration now prohibits operators from leaving trains hauling hazardous materials without an operator, unless receiving prior authorization, and requires employees to report to dispatchers the number of hand brakes used.
Original Print Headline: Tank car compared to Ford Pinto
Transportation
As automakers race to make cheaper electric cars with greater battery range, General Motors is working on one that can go 200 miles per charge at a cost of about $30,000, a top company executive said Monday.
BNSF Railway Co. announced Monday it is spending $125 million to expand and improve its system in Oklahoma. Projects will include a new bypass connection at the Cherokee rail yard in west Tulsa and extending a siding area on the carrier's tracks near Mannford.
