By Russell Gold
U.S. regulators are urging railroads to change the way they deal
with wheel defects, saying the problem may have caused a fiery
oil-train derailment in Illinois last month.
Despite multiple warning signs, a train carrying crude oil from
North Dakota to Philadelphia continued to travel on a potentially
faulty wheel, according to a preliminary federal investigation.
Twenty-one cars of a BNSF Railway Co. oil train derailed near
Galena, Ill., 160 miles west of Chicago. Several cars ruptured
during the accident and the oil inside caught fire, generating
large explosions.
On Friday, the Federal Railroad Administration issued a safety
advisory pointing to a broken wheel and telling railroads to act
more aggressively to fix similar defects found on other trains.
According to investigators, a trackside device flagged the oil
train's defective wheel about 130 miles before the derailment. A
month before the accident, other similar devices registered a
reading on this railcar's wheel at a level that indicated there was
a flat spot that made it "condemnable," according to the safety
advisory.
Despite the reading, BNSF didn't break any industry or federal
rule. Industry guidelines suggest that the wheel be replaced the
next time the tank car was sent for repairs.
In late March, BNSF began slowing down its trains that haul
crude oil to 35 miles an hour in cities with over 100,000
residents, according to a letter sent to its customers. The
railroad stepped up the frequency of track inspections to 2 1/2
times the rate required by FRA regulators along certain
waterways.
BNSF also said it would act faster to take railcars out of
service if its own equipment detects a problem with a car,
locomotive or wheels, a spokesman said. "It's clear to us that
given the recent incidences, along with our own in Galena, that
more needs to be done," he said.
The rail agency's new safety advisory said railroads should
strengthen their criteria for handling wheels with potentially
critical defects, and suggests they replace wheels showing flat
spots more quickly. Government regulators also noted that defective
wheels can put stress on train tracks that can lead to breaks or
cracks in the rail.
The safety advisory was one of several advisories and a new
emergency rule issued Friday by the U.S. Transportation Department
as part of its continuing effort to make trains carrying crude oil
safer.
The new policies also address train speed limits and information
about the cargo. In the next few weeks, the government is expected
to issue new rules about the design and build of tank cars carrying
hazardous liquids.
A spate of derailments and fiery explosions involving trains
transporting crude oil from North Dakota has prompted the
government to undertake a wide-ranging review of its rules. The
volume of oil hauled by railroads has mushroomed in recent years,
increasing to nearly 374 million barrels last year from 20 million
barrels in 2010, according to the U.S. Energy Information
Administration.
An emergency order, also issued Friday by the Federal Railroad
Administration, places a 40 mph speed limit in urban areas for
trains carrying significant volumes of flammable liquid, such as
crude oil. Several North American railroad operators had already
agreed to a similar, voluntary speed limit last year after multiple
oil train derailments.
U.S. regulators are also seeking to bring greater transparency
to the crude being hauled across the country. In another advisory
issued Friday, the rail agency and the Pipeline and Hazardous
Materials Safety Administration said they want railroads to
maintain records tracking the crude from the wells where it is
pumped from the ground all the way to the refineries buying the
oil. Those records should include what energy company pumped the
oil out of the ground, what trucking company or pipeline carried it
to the railroad terminal, and the results of any tests performed on
the crude to determine its volatility and flammability.
Betsy Morris contributed to this article.
Write to Russell Gold at russell.gold@wsj.com
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