Page 13 - Flathead Beacon // 11.26.14

FLATHEADBEACON.COM NEWS
NOVEMBER 26, 2014 | 13
Local departments traveled to Colorado this year for specialized training to fight oil train fires
By JUSTIN FRANZ of the Beacon
As more crude oil rides the rails, fire- fighters from Northwest Montana and around the country are preparing for the worst-case scenario – an oil train wreck.
Firefighters from Whitefish and Libby recently traveled to Colorado for a three-day training session on how to fight a crude oil fire or respond to a haz- ardous materials spill. The training ses- sions included classes where firefighters learned about the different types of haz- ardous materials and train cars and in- cluded field exercises where they fought simulated oil train fires.
The movement of oil by rail gained national headlines in 2013 following a series of explosive train wrecks, includ- ing one in Quebec that killed 47 people. According to information released by BNSF Railway and the state of Mon- tana, more than a dozen oil trains trav- el through Flathead, Glacier and Lin- coln counties every week. Much of the crude oil is coming from the Bakken region of eastern Montana and North Dakota, which has seen a rapid increase in oil production in recent years. In 2008, Class 1 railroads, which include the largest rail companies in America, moved just 9,500 carloads of crude oil. Five years later they moved more than 400,000 carloads of crude.
Earlier this year, the nation’s larg- est railroads agreed to spend $5 million in 2014 to develop a specialized oil-by- rail training program for first respond- ers. Since then, nearly 1,500 firefighters from around the country have traveled to Pueblo, Colorado for training classes at the Transportation Technology Cen- ter, Inc. Of the nearly 1,500 firefighters sent to Colorado, almost half of them have come from communities along BNSF Railway’s 32,000-mile system, according to railroad spokesperson Matt Jones. The railroad pays for tuition and travel expenses and 20 firefighters from Montana have attended the classes this year. Jones said the railroad also has specialized training tank cars that trav- el across the rail system and this year it has been used to train more than 400 firefighters in Montana.
The Transportation Technology Center course provides first responders with information on how to respond to different types of wrecks and spills. Ac- cording to Libby Volunteer Fire Depart- ment Assistant Chief Steve Lauer, one of two Libby first responders who attended the training this summer, they prac- ticed various techniques, including how to cool down tank cars to prevent them from exploding and how to use firefight- ing foam to fight a blaze.
Whitefish Interim Chief Joe Page said his department has sent six fire- fighters to Colorado for the training and at least one them is always on duty so someone with the specialized training would be there to help coordinate a re- sponse if there ever was an oil train ac- cident,. Page said the training his fire- fighters received is applicable to other hazardous material spills.
“I think we have the knowledge now that we’ll be able to properly respond to one of these derailments,” Page said.
The railroad industry has also de- veloped a special online training course and Page said all of the department’s firefighters would be required to take the four-hour course.
The Whitefish Fire Department recently held a tabletop exercise with BNSF officials on how it would respond to a wreck in or around Whitefish. The department also worked with a railroad contractor earlier this year on how to use firefighting equipment and foam that has been stationed in the Whitefish yard in case of a wreck.
However, some local officials are saying the railroad still needs to do more. Recently at a meeting of the Flat- head Basin Commission, board chair and former Glacier National Park super- intendent Chas Cartwright urged BNSF to prepare for a wreck along the park’s southern boundary. Cartwright said the railroad should organize those ef- forts with local agencies using the Great Northern Environmental Stewardship Area. GNESA was created in 1991 to pre- pare a Habitat Conservation Plan to pro- tect grizzly bears that were attracted to the tracks by grain spilled from passing trains.
“It’s going to take a lot of coordina-
tion to pull this together... If something
happened right now we would be in a
world of trouble,” Cartwright said, add-
ing that a spill in the Middle Fork canyon
could have major impacts on the park
and Flathead Lake. “This is our issue,
not just BNSF. We are the people who
Firefighters from Libby and Whitefish have recently traveled to Colorado for three-day training sessions to prepare for an oil train derailment.
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE LIBBY VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT
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Whitefish, Libby Firefighters Prepare for Oil Train Wrecks
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