All posts by Roger Straw

Editor, owner, publisher of The Benicia Independent
Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Explosion, Fire

NPR: What we know three days after the Fayette Co. oil train derailment

Repost from WMKY FM, Morehead, KYNational Public Radio

What We Know Three Days After the Fayette Co. Oil Train Derailment

By Dave Mistich, Thu February 19, 2015 2:25 pm
Credit U.S. Coast Guard photo by Chief Petty Officer Angie Vallier

Investigators from the Federal Railroad Administration and the Pipeline Hazardous Materials Safety Administration are on the scene of Monday’s oil train derailment near Mount Carbon, W.Va. The incident sparked massive fireballs stretching hundreds of feet in the air. One home was destroyed in the incident and the homeowner was treated for smoke inhalation and then released.

1. Some initial reports from the scene turned out to be incorrect.

Department of Military Affairs and Public safety spokesman Lawrence Messina said Monday that one and possibly more cars fell into the Kanawha River.

As a result, West Virginia American Water shut down intakes at their Montgomery and Cedar Grove. Those intakes were reopened after no evidence of crude oil was detected in the river. 

Messina and other officials, including the state Department of Environmental Protection, later said no tanker cars fell into the river and no evidence of oil could be detected.

2. Federal Authorities and CSX say the train was not speeding.

The Federal Railroad Administration said Thursday that the CSX-owned train that derailed was traveling at 33 mph. They said the speed limit in the area where the incident occurred was 50 mph.

3. Fires continue to burn and containment is the focus of the response.

Kelley Gillenwater of the DEP said at least one small fire continued to burn Thursday morning.

Environmental protective and monitoring measures on land, air, the Kanawha River and Armstrong Creek. Gillenwater said response crews vacuumed about 5,000 gallons of an oil-water mixture on Wednesday. CSX contractors, overseen by the U.S. Coast Guard and DEP, were able to deploy about 500 feet of containment boom as a precautionary measure to limit potential impact on the environment.

Response teams are beginning to remove derailed cars that have not been involved in the fires. says they will begin transferring oil from the damaged cars to other tanks for removal from the site when it is safe to do so.

4. Quick Facts: Numbers on the Derailment

  • The train consisted of two locomotives and 109 rail cars (107 tank cars and two buffer cars).
  • 27 cars derailed and 19 were involved in fires.
  • The train was carrying a total of 3 million gallons of Bakken crude oil, according to the Associated Press.
  • Each of the tankers contained 29,500 gallons of oil.
Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Explosion, Fire, Foam, Train speed

FRA Official: Speed doesn’t appear to be factor in oil train derailment; may need to use dry chemical on lingering fires

Repost from The Star Tribune | Nation, Minneapolis, MN
[Editor: An updated version of this appears on the Associated Press.  – RS]

Official: Speed doesn’t appear to be factor in oil train derailment in southern West Virginia

By Associated Press, Updated: February 19, 2015 – 2:05 PM

MOUNT CARBON, W.Va. — A federal official says speed doesn’t appear to be a factor in an oil train derailment in southern West Virginia.

Federal Railroad Administration acting administrator Sarah Feinberg said Thursday the CSX train was going 33 mph at the time of Monday’s crash in the town of Mount Carbon. The speed limit was 50 mph.

The derailment shot fireballs into the sky, leaked oil into a Kanawha River tributary and destroyed a house. Nineteen of the 107 tank cars were involved in the fires, which continued smoldering Thursday. The fires have prevented investigators from gaining full access to the crash scene.

Feinberg says it might be necessary to use a dry chemical to douse the fires, out of worry that using water or spray foam would wash oil into the river.

Bakken Crude, Crude By Rail, Derailment, Explosion, Fire, Volatile gases

DOT: Gas vapor eyed as factor in West Virginia oil train fireball

Repost from Reuters

Gas vapor eyed as factor in West Virginia oil train fireball

By Patrick Rucker, Thu Feb 19, 2015 3:26pm EST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Federal investigators will examine whether pressurized gas played a role in the massive blast that followed the derailment of a train carrying crude oil through West Virginia this week, the U.S. Transportation Department said on Thursday.

Questioning the possible role of gas vapors in the West Virginia fire broadens the debate over how to ensure public safety at a time when drastically larger volumes of crude oil are being shipped by rail and roll through cities and towns.

At least two dozen oil tankers jumped a CSX Corp track about 30 miles south of the state capital, Charleston, on Monday, touching off a fireball that sent flames hundreds of feet into the sky.

The U.S. Transportation Department said it has an investigator at the site to take samples of crude once the wreckage stops burning.

“We will measure vapor pressure in the tank cars that derailed in West Virginia,” said department spokeswoman Suzanne Emmerling.

Some experts say the nature of the explosion, which saw a dense cloud of smoke and flame soaring upwards, could be explained by the presence of highly pressurized gas trapped in crude oil moving in the rail cars.

“Vapor pressure could be a factor,” said Andre Lemieux of the Canadian Crude Quality Technical Association, a trade group which is helping the Canadian government adopt crude oil quality tests.

The American Petroleum Institute, the leading voice for the oil industry, declined to comment on whether high vapor pressure might have played a role in West Virginia.

“What we need to do now is allow the accident investigators to do their jobs,” said Brian Straessle, a spokesman for the trade group.

In the past twelve months, API and the North Dakota Petroleum Council have argued that the dangers of vapor pressure are exaggerated, citing self-funded studies that indicate vapor pressure readings are safe.

The Transportation Department did not call for regulations governing the presence of gas vapors in a national oil train safety plan it drafted last summer and is now with the White House for review.

That plan would have oil trains fitted with advanced braking systems to prevent pileups and tougher shells akin to those carrying volatile propane gas on the tracks.

The question of whether gas vapors make oil shipments more prone to detonate has been kept on the margins of the U.S. debate over transporting oil by rail.

The oil train sector has thrived in recent years, pushed by a crude oil renaissance in North Dakota’s Bakken region.

(Reporting By Patrick Rucker; Ernest Scheyder contributed from Williston, North Dakota; editing by Andrew Hay)
Crude By Rail

KPIX: Bay Area Crude Oil-By-Rail Shipments Halted After Price Per Barrel Drops Sharply

Repost from KPIX5 CBS San Francisco Bay Area
[Editor: the video identifies Kinder Morgan as the company that has stopped transporting Bakken crude by rail.  (The text below doesn’t mention Kinder Morgan.  Neither text nor video explore the shutdown at Tesoro as a possible contributing reason for the stoppage.  See also Martinez News-Gazette: Kinder Morgan halts shipment of crude in Bay Area.  – RS]

Bay Area Crude Oil-By-Rail Shipments Halted After Price Per Barrel Drops Sharply

By Christin Ayers, February 17, 2015 11:03 PM

RICHMOND (CBS SF) — The low price of oil has has prompted an energy company to halt the transportation by rail of Bakken crude through the Bay Area.

KPIX 5 learned that the trains have been abruptly halted after crude oil prices dropped sharply, making it less cost effective to transport.

The Tesoro refinery in Martinez had been ordering the more expensive and more explosive grade of crude.

The last train carrying Bakken crude oil passed through the Bay Area on November 22nd.

Richmond Fire Marshal Terry Harris said the city was glad to hear of the development, saying, “It relaxes everyone so that we know the product is not coming into the city.”

Train cars carrying Bakken crude derailed in West Virginia Monday, sparking a massive fire.

Harris’ firefighters are preparing for a possible derailment if trains begin carrying the oil when prices rise again.

“It just erupts in a ball of fire, so we [would be] trying to cool the cars within that 25-30 minutes,” Harris said.