Tag Archives: Norfolk Southern

Crude By Rail, Homeland Security, McClatchy News, Public Safety, Terrorist attack

FBI: Oil Trains At Risk of “Extremist” Attacks

Repost from DeSmogBlog
[Editor: DeSmog refers here to an October 2014 article by Curtis Tate of McClatchy News that first broke this story.  I regret that the Benicia Independent failed to take note of this important article back then.  I will add that I have mixed feelings about this report.  Folks my age are aware of a long history of rogue investigations by the FBI, and we’ve become understandably wary of government agencies that serve the needs of corporate interests.  Nonetheless, I fear that there are in fact real and horrendous risks of security attacks by unbalanced individuals on the left and the right – and abroad.  For me, this is only one more reason to ban oil trains.  – RS]

FBI Advisory: Oil Trains At Risk of “Extremist” Attack, But Lacks “Specific Information” To Verify

By Steve Horn, July 18, 2015 – 05:58
First responders in Lac Megantic. Photo: Transportation Board of Canada.

A document* marked “Confidential” and published a year ago today, on July 18, 2014, by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) concluded that “environmental extremists” could target oil-by-rail routes, as first reported on by McClatchy. But the Bureau also concedes upfront that it lacks “specific information” verifying this hunch.

Rail industry lobbying groups published the one-page FBI Private Sector Advisory as an exhibit to a jointly-submitted August 2014 comment sent to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (DOT), which has proposed “bomb trains” regulations currently under review by the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). 

FBI Oil by Rail Advisory

Image Credit: Federal Bureau of Investigation

We’ve heard overtures like this one before from the FBI, other agencies and from industry players themselves.

As reported here on DeSmog, the FBI worked alongside TransCanada to take photos and monitor Tar Sands Blockade-affiliated activists and other anti-Keystone XL pipeline activists back in 2012 and 2013. The Guardian, Bloomberg and Earth Island Journal have also recently published stories, based on documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, further confirming that the FBI worked closely alongside TransCanada to monitor and disrupt activists opposed to the pipeline.

In August 2014, DeSmog also reported that in Maryland, rail company Norfolk Southern submitted a July 23, 2014 legal filing to the Maryland Department of the Environment citing Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda in its attempt to justify keeping oil-by-rail routes a trade secret. Norfolk submitted that filing merely five days after the FBI published its Private Sector Advisory.

And at a 2011 industry public relations conference in Houston, a communication manager at a major company involved in hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) for shale oil and gas told the audience his community affairs employees use psychological warfare (PSYOPs) techniques in local communities, while another compared fracking opponents to “insurgents” who should be fended off by PR campaigns modeled after counterinsurgency warfare.

ISIS, AQAP, Bin Laden

While Norfolk Southern cited Biden Laden and Al Qaeda in its affidavit, the FBI honed in on the Islamic State (IS), also sometimes referred to as the Islamic State in Syria (ISIS) or the Islamic State in the Levant (ISIL). It also mentioned Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) — and Osama Bin Laden.

Like Maryland, the rail industry lobbying groups cited the FBI Advisory as a way to argue against disclosing oil-by-rail routes to the public.

“It is not just environmental extremists who pose a threat to the transportation of crude by rail.  Foreign terrorists are also a risk,” wrote the industry lobbying groups. “Two publications reportedly by Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula contain threats against crude oil trains…Furthermore, information from Osama Bin Laden’s compound indicates that Al-Qaeda has contemplated attacks on trains.”

Louis Warchot, an attorney for the Association of American Railroads, co-authored the comment submitted to DOT.

Before working for the association, Warchot “served in the United States Armed Forces and retired in the rank of Colonel in the United States Army Reserve Judge Advocate General’s Corps.” On top of his law, business masters and undergraduate degrees from University of California-Berkeley, Warchot also has a masters from the U.S. Army War College in Strategic Studies.

“Extremism” or Peaceful Activism?

In the FBI‘s advisory, it never uses the term “activist” or “advocate,” opting instead for the term “extremist.” So what does an “extremist” do and what exactly constitutes an extremist?

“Environmental extremists,” explains the Bureau, “believe the use of fossil fuels contributes to the destruction of our environment and may believe that transport of crude oil creates the potential for environmental hazardous train derailments and oil spills.”

It’s a definition that almost anyone who understands the science of climate change or is concerned about oil train explosions could fall under. The FBI then lays out what these “extremists” do.

According to the FBI, they use social media to spread awareness of oil-by-rail routes (like sharing a link to the ForestEthics website “Oil Train Blast Zone”) and make or send “threatening” phone calls or emails to industry, contractors or others associated with moving crude by rail.

“[T]actics to disrupt, obstruct or interrupt rail traffic to delay crude oil transportation” also makes the FBI cut, which is an activity that anti-coal activists sometimes take part in as a means of delaying coal trains.

FBI Oil by Rail Advisory
Image Credit: Federal Bureau of Investigation

“The FBI should be looking carefully at the imminent threat oil trains pose to millions of Americans living in the blast zone, but they should then turn their attention to the lax rules from the Department of Transportation and the oil and rail industry who fight common sense safety steps and hide train routes from emergency responders,” Ross Hammond, US Campaigns Director for ForestEthics, told DeSmog.

Speaking of threats, perhaps the FBI should concern itself with the explosive oil-by-rail trains that pass underneath West Point and right next to nuclear missile launch sites, rather than things that fall under the purview of First Amendment-protected speech threatening to industry profits.

*An earlier version of this article cited Chemical Security News as the first website to report on the FBI document. McClatchy DC was actually the first news outlet to report on the document’s existence as part of the U.S. Department of Transportation oil-by-rail rulemaking docket back in October 2014. We regret the error.

Photo Credit: First responders in Lac Megantic via Transportation Board of Canada.

Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Hazmat notification, High Hazard Flammable Trains (HHFTs)

Railroads use new oil shipment rule to fight transparency

Repost from McClatchy DC 

Railroads use new oil shipment rule to fight transparency

By Curtis Tate, McClatchy Washington Bureau, 6/25/15
A CSX oil train moves east through Selkirk Yard near Albany, N.Y., on May 26, 2015. The Albany area has become a hub for crude by rail shipments as East Coast refineries have replaced imported oil with mid-continent sources. CSX and other railroads continue their push to keep routing and volume information about the shipments from the public. CURTIS TATE — McClatchy

WASHINGTON — Railroads may have found a new weapon in their fight to keep information about oil train shipments from the public: a federal rule that was supposed to increase transparency.

The U.S. Department of Transportation insists that its May 1 final rule on oil trains, which mostly addresses an outdated tank car design, does not support the railroads’ position, nor was it intended to leave anyone in the dark.

But in recent court filings in Maryland, two major oil haulers have cited the department’s new rule to justify their argument that no one except emergency responders should know what routes the trains use or how many travel through each state during a given week.

Those details have been publicly available in most states for a year, though some sided with the railroads and refused to release them. The periodic reports have helped state and local officials with risk assessments, emergency planning and firefighter training.

The department’s rule was expected to expand the existing disclosure requirements. In its 395-page rule, the department acknowledged an overwhelming volume of public comments supporting more transparency. But ultimately, it offered the opposite.

The final rule ends the existing disclosure requirements next March. Railroads no longer would be required to provide information to the states, leaving emergency responders to request details about oil train shipments on their own, and the public would be shut out entirely.

The switch floored those who submitted comments in favor of increased transparency.

“The justification was not consistent with the comments given,” said Denise Rucker Krepp, a former senior counsel for the House Homeland Security Committee and chief counsel for the U.S. Maritime administration. “They’re supposed to be the same.”

Facing push-back from Capitol Hill, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx assured lawmakers in a May 28 letter that “we fully support the public disclosure of this information to the extent allowed by applicable state, local and tribal laws.”

Foxx added that the department was not attempting to undermine transparency.

“That was certainly not the intent of the rule,” he wrote eight Senate Democrats.

But Foxx’s assurances differ sharply from the assertions of Norfolk Southern and CSX in court documents filed last month in Maryland. The documents are related to a case last summer when the railroads sued the state to block the release of oil train reports to McClatchy.

The final rule provides “clear and unequivocal guidance” that information about oil train routes and volumes are security- and commercially-sensitive, attorneys for the railroads wrote on May 5 to Judge Lawrence Fletcher-Hill of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City.

That classification would trigger an exemption from the state’s Public Information Act.

A trial is scheduled for August, though Fletcher-Hill could decide before then whether to dismiss the case in favor of the railroads or the state.

Both companies declined to comment on the case.

Last May, the Transportation Department issued an emergency order requiring railroads to notify states of large shipments of Bakken crude oil after a series of fiery derailments involving the light crude from shale formations in North Dakota. The worst of those derailments killed 47 people in Quebec in July 2013.

Railroads have insisted that the oil train details are sensitive from a security and business perspective and should be exempt from state open records laws. They attempted to shield the data from public view last year by asking states to sign nondisclosure agreements.

Some states initially agreed, but most declined. McClatchy sought oil train reports from 30 states through open records laws. All but half a dozen states released at least part of what McClatchy requested.

Last fall, two rail industry trade groups lobbied the Transportation Department to end the reporting requirement. In a notice published in the Federal Register in October, the department rebuffed the request.

“DOT finds no basis to conclude that the public disclosure of the information is detrimental to transportation safety,” the Federal Railroad Administration wrote, adding that the trade associations “do not document any actual harm that has occurred by the public release of the information.”

But when the department unveiled its final rule in May, the requirements more closely aligned with what the railroads sought.

“Under this approach,” the regulation states, “the transportation of crude oil by rail can . . . avoid the negative security and business implications of widespread public disclosure of routing and volume data.”

The Maryland Attorney General’s Office has cited the department’s October Federal Register notice to support its position that the state can release the oil train information.

But the final rule is the last word, attorneys for the railroads say. They wrote Fletcher-Hill on May 29 that the state “relies on non-final comments published by the Federal Railroad Administration” and “fails to acknowledge the highly persuasive guidance articulated in the final rule.”

Unlike other arguments put forth by the railroads and their trade groups that have swayed few state or federal officials – including speculative claims of terrorism, competitive harm and even insider trading – the final rule may prove more persuasive to a judge.

The eight Senate Democrats wrote to Foxx on May 6, the same day another oil train derailed and caught fire in North Dakota. It was the fifth such incident in North America this year. They asked the department to reconsider the rule.

“The onus for obtaining detailed crude-by-rail information should not be on the local jurisdiction,” they wrote, and they called on the department “to clarify that broader crude-by-rail information will remain accessible to the public.”

Apparently backing away from the final rule’s expiration date for the emergency order, Foxx replied that it would remain “in full force and effect until further notice” and that the department would be looking for ways to codify the disclosure requirement.

But Krepp said that’s exactly what everyone was expecting in the rule.

“If they wanted that,” she said, “they would have put that in the rule-making.”

Krepp said the department made its intentions clear in the final rule.

“They have the final rule now,” she said. “They have to live with it.”

Crude By Rail, Emergency Readiness & Response, Ethanol, Federal pre-emption, Federal Regulation (U.S.), Hazmat notification, High Hazard Flammable Trains (HHFTs), Homeland Security, Rail routing

New oil-train safety rules will put public back in the dark

Repost from the Bellingham Herald

New oil-train safety rules will put public back in the dark

By Curtis Tate, McClatchy Washington Bureau, May 1, 2015

WASHINGTON — Details about rail shipments of crude oil and ethanol will be made exempt from public disclosure under new regulations announced by the U.S. Department of Transportation on Friday.

The department will end its requirement, put in place a year ago, that required railroads to share information about large volumes of Bakken crude oil with state officials.

Instead, railroads will share information directly with emergency responders, but it will be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act and state public records laws, the way other hazardous materials such as chlorine and anhydrous ammonia are currently protected.

After a CSX train carrying Bakken crude oil derailed and caught fire in Lynchburg, Va., on April 30 last year, federal regulators required railroads to notify emergency response agencies of shipments of 1 million gallons or more of Bakken crude oil through their states.

The railroads complied, but asked states to sign agreements to keep the information confidential. Some agreed, but most refused, citing a conflict with their open records laws.

Using FOIA and state public records laws, McClatchy last year obtained full or partial data on Bakken rail shipments from 24 states. Another five states denied McClatchy’s requests.

CSX and Norfolk Southern, the dominant eastern railroads, sued Maryland to block the state from releasing its information to McClatchy. A trial is scheduled for next month.

McClatchy, however, was able to obtain some of the information about the Maryland shipments by going to Amtrak. Norfolk Southern uses a portion of the passenger railroad’s Northeast Corridor for its crude oil trains.

Last fall, the rail industry’s leading trade groups quietly asked the Transportation Department to drop the requirement.

In pretrial documents in the Maryland lawsuit, the railroads’ lawyers maintain that disclosure of the information – including the routes the trains take and the counties through which they pass – could compromise security, erode the companies’ competitive edge and harm their customers.

As of October, the Federal Railroad Administration disagreed. It said that information about the Bakken shipments was neither security nor commercially sensitive and was not exempt from public release. It also said it would continue the reporting requirement.

But on page 242 of the 395-page final rule the department published on Friday, it appeared that the railroads got their wish.

Starting next year, emergency responders will have access to information about shipments of all types of crude oil, not just Bakken, ethanol and other flammable liquids. The volume threshold will also be lowered to 20 or more cars of flammable liquid in a continuous block, or 35 or more cars dispersed throughout a train.

The shipments, however, will be classified as “security sensitive” and details about them shielded from the public.

“Under this approach,” the regulation states, “the transportation of crude oil by rail can…avoid the negative security and business implications of widespread public disclosure of routing and volume data.”

Derailment, Empty tank cars, Public permitting, Rail Safety, Residue train, Train collission

Pennsylvania man in good condition after collision with “empty” oil train

Repost from Lancaster Online
[Editor:  I have been asking various oil train experts about the volatility of “empty” crude oil tank cars.  These cars are not truly empty: returning trains of nearly-empty cars are referred to as “residue trains,” and carry the same identifying hazmat placard as when they are full.  Of course, these cars have been known to derail or crash as happened in this report.  I have not been able to find much documentation, but several reports claim that these cars can explode, sending shrapnel and causing major (and presumably relatively short-lived) fires.  Rail and oil insurers are certain to have calculated risk assessments on these cars.  But I have no record of this risk being addressed in permitting reviews.  What additional safety risk is added to a crude-by-rail project being considered for permitting in a city like Benicia?  Please contact me if you have further information, send to rogrmail at gmail dot com.  – RS]

Marietta man, 85, in good condition after collision with oil train

By Tom Knapp, Apr 7, 2015
crash 032715
The wreckage of a pickup truck is shown after a collision March 27 with a northbound oil train. BRIAN LEID

An 85-year-old man is recovering after his pickup truck was struck by an empty oil train March 27 in Bainbridge.

Clark “Red” Arnold, of Marietta, was in critical condition as recently as Friday, but was listed in good condition Tuesday, a spokeswoman at Penn State Hershey Medical Center said.

Arnold was trapped in the truck after he apparently stopped his vehicle in the train’s path.

“He just didn’t hear the train,” Conoy Township supervisor Stephen Mohr said Friday afternoon.

“He and the train got to the intersection at about the same time. When he did see the train, he panicked and stopped on the tracks.”

Mohr, who witnessed the crash, said he had been speaking to Arnold just moments before the accident at the nearby Koser Park Boat launch area.

“You’re helpless,” he said. “I knew it was going to happen before it happened, but there’s nothing you can do.”

The crash occurred at the Race Street crossing at North Front Street.

Emergency crews were called to the scene at 1:29 p.m.

The Norfolk Southern oil train was heading north toward Harrisburg and was not carrying oil at the time of the crash, according to police.

Local, state and federal officials have expressed concerns about explosive Bakken crude oil being transported by train after several recent derailments.

Oil trains, often pulling more than 100 tanker cars, roll through about 35 miles of Lancaster County along the Susquehanna River up to 16 times a week.

Arnold was freed from his truck and taken to Hershey Medical Center for treatment, according to Lt. Stephen Englert of Susquehanna Regional Police.

“It was pretty serious,” Mohr said. “He took a beating. … They had to take the vehicle apart to free him.”

Mohr said Arnold was “conscious and talking to us” while rescue workers freed him from the truck.

There are no crossgates or warning lights at the intersection, Mohr noted.

Witnesses at the scene stated they heard the Norfolk Southern train horn well before the train collided with the vehicle, according to the Susquehanna Regional Police report.

Randy Gockley, director of the Lancaster County Emergency Management Agency, said the train did not derail, and responders on the scene reported no leakage from the train.

The Race Street intersection is the entrance to Bainbridge American Legion Park, which serves as the trailhead for the Northwest Lancaster County River Trail, as well as the location of the Bainbridge Inn.

Englert said the collision does not make him any more concerned about oil trains traveling through Conoy.

Capt. Leonard Crater of Bainbridge Fire Department said the the victim apparently “got a little too close to the tracks, and was unaware of the train coming.”

Onlookers “didn’t think he was trying to beat the train,” Crater said.

He was glad train cars were empty so “there was no kind of worry about any kind of leak or explosions or anything like that.”

The Bainbridge fire captain said nearly 20 firefighters from his department and nearby units responded, along with police.

Penny Rhan of 114 Race St., some 50 yards from the crash, heard a boom but didn’t initially realize it had been a train accident.

Another Race Street resident, Wayne Brooks, said “it’s been a long time since we’ve had an accident there.”

Staff writers David O’Connor and Ryan Robinson contributed to this report.