Derailed US train in bursts into flames in Lynchburg

[yorkie]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-27232523

Derailed US train in bursts into flames in Lynchburg

A freight train carrying crude oil has derailed and burst into flames in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Hundreds of people have been evacuated from a number of buildings in the city, but no injuries have been reported.

Oil has been spilling into the James river, according to reports.

Three or four tanker cars carrying crude oil were breached, according to a tweet by the city of Lynchburg, and more than a dozen tanker cars were involved in the collision.

A city spokeswoman said several train cars derailed at about 14:00 local time (18:00 GMT), and about 300 people have been evacuated from nearby buildings.

These sort of incidents seem to be rather more common in North America than over here, though admittedly they do run a lot more trains than we do. But from what I've heard/read, their safety standards don't seem to be quite as high as ours.

No injuries, thankfully, and that's the main thing.

 

[user15681]

Thank god there are no injuries.

It's funny you should mention it seeming more common in North America than here, I thought exactly the same when I saw this article earlier!

 

[DownSouth]

Statistics would actually say that rail freight is safer in the USA than in Britain, purely because of the trillions of tonne-kilometres shifted each year without incident.

Hardly a week goes by without at least one freight train derailment in Britain being mentioned on this site, and that's despite Britain comparing to the USA in the following ways:
Land area: if Britain became the 51st state of the USA it would rank as only the 12th-largest state.
Total trackage: 7% of the US total trackage.
Net tonne-kilometres of freight per year: 0.8% of the USA.
Total freight market share: 11% in Britain, 42% in the USA.

If we are to assume that US railways are the equal of Britain's in terms of safety, there should be ~125 newsworthy freight incidents in the USA for every one in Britain.

I would suggest that Australia has an even better record - we have fewer freight incidents in absolute numbers than Britain despite running over three times as much freight.

 

[talltim]

Plus the fact that you probably lump Canadian accidents (Lac Megantic) in with US ones mentally without realising it

 

[Ploughman]

How many of the incidents in the UK result in the fires that we see in the US / Canadian incidents?
I would consider the safety record there to be not of the best.

 

[HSTEd]

The train at lac megantic massed ten thousand tonnes, rather more than any British train.

 

[PFX]

How many of the incidents in the UK result in the fires that we see in the US / Canadian incidents?
I would consider the safety record there to be not of the best.

They haul chalk, we haul cheese.

Safety isn't measured on a fire/no fire basis.

 

[DownSouth]

They haul chalk, we haul cheese.

Safety isn't measured on a fire/no fire basis.

Exactly. The reason there are rarely fires on derailed British freight trains is simply due to the fact that only trivial amounts of fuel go by rail in Britain.