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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 184.144.72.52 (talk) at 15:49, 11 July 2013 (→‎Other problems with MMA). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Picture

I've been trying to find a free image for this, no luck so far. I've contacted the SQ by email to try to get this one released, but I'm not hopeful. Someone on twitter or facebook could try communicating with them also. pm (talk) 22:05, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Here's a free image (CC-BY-2.0 license): http://www.flickr.com/photos/home_of_chaos/9243170498/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:981:524D:1:4416:33C1:D9B3:B8D4 (talk) 23:47, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Map

A map of Lac Megantic with the site of the derailment and outline of the train tracks against a streetmap would be good. Also, the area burned. -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 06:23, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well, we won't know the area burned until the burning stops. DS (talk) 11:40, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The fire is under control, and is not extending beyond what was previously burnt, so unless they loose control, we know the area burnt. -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 22:21, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

MMA route

I've removed this, along with the MarketWatch ref: "MMA operates between Montreal, in the west and Brownville Junction, Maine, USA, in the east." I had initially tagged the first half citation needed because I couldn't find it anywhere, although I did find a reference to Brownville (or Brownsville). It was however as the final destination of the MMA cars for this train, not its limit of operations nor the final destination of the oil. Looking at the map from MMA's website, the lines do start from Montreal, but it's messy in the east.

I still can't find any reference however that states the train had left Montreal for this particular trip. There seems to be other junctions on the map, so I can't infer anything from it. The only thing I could reliably say is something like "The train would have left MMA custody in Brownville Junction, Maine", which we don't care, although I don't mind if someone puts it back.

" Le convoi de 72 wagons-citernes et cinq locomotives était parti de Montréal, à 250 km à l'ouest, et devait se rendre sur la côte atlantique, dans le port de Saint-John (Nouveau-Brunswick)." [1] K7L (talk) 17:42, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Fine, but I wish it also gave a reference. For all we know, it came from this article. I'll add it. pm (talk) 17:52, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

See also section

I have replaced the link to the generic Lists of rail accidents article (a list of lists) with links to the articles about two other derailments of fuel trains in towns which resulted in explosions, fire and multiple deaths.

The Viareggio train derailment article also links to the Soham rail disaster, which was a WWII fire and explosion of an ammunition train just outside the town (following heroic acts of the driver to get the burning train away from the station). I'm in two minds about its relevance here. What do others think? Thryduulf (talk) 18:32, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There was a third one there before with quite a long description, plus a link to the lists. All were removed at the same time. I'd maybe trim the current descriptions or remove them altogether, just leaving the links. Or leave it as is, I don't mind much. pm (talk) 18:41, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The one with the very long description was the Nishapur train disaster, which is the one of the current two. I did trim the description somewhat but I certainly wouldn't object to it being trimmed further (brevity is not my strong suit).
The other link is Summit Tunnel fire, which I initially didn't reinclude based on it not being in a populated area. Having read the interesting article (although the tone needs cleaning in places) I'm can see arguments for and against including it as it seems to be the fire and explosion on a (fuel) train (at least prior to Nishapur) and settlements were evacuated. Overall I'd say leave it out, but that's a very weak preference and I wont object if someone thinks it should be there. Thryduulf (talk) 19:43, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

5 locomotives

The refs don't actually say 5 locomotives, does anyone have one that actually says 5?--Daffydavid (talk) 21:40, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Both mentions of 5 locomotives are supported by two different references: the MMA's press release ("train with 72 carloads of crude oil and 5 locomotive units derailed") and a bbc article ("had five locomotive engines and 73 cars filled with light crude oil"). Is there another mention somewhere that I don't see? pm (talk) 22:56, 7 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Apparently I need to learn how to read. Thx. --Daffydavid (talk) 04:48, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

How did the locomotives on the head end become detached or uncoupled ? We're the locomotives damaged when the eastbound train crashed into Lac Megantic?

According to #Handbrakes, the brakes were set on all five locomotives but only on 10 of the 72 cars, despite the train being parked on the mainline on a 1.2% grade. It's possible that the cars (most of which didn't have the brake manually set), moving downhill by gravity, pulled on the five engines (which all had brakes set) until the coupling released or broke? Dunno, supposedly the couplings were still usable as nine cars were pulled clear of the wreckage soon after the derailment. K7L (talk) 22:19, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps, but the train was headed eastbound towards Lac Megantic, meaning the locomotives should have lead the crash. Were the locomotives involved in the crash? And if not, how did 72 tank cars manage to get around the locomotives on single track?Bubblecuffer (talk) 01:33, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In this picture, and unmentioned in all accounts I have read, there are what appear to be freight container wagons standing close to the derailed tanker wagons: http://static.euronews.com/articles/231172/606x341_231172_quebec-sous-le-choc-au-lendemain-de-l.jpg

Added links to Runaway Train article

I added links to Wikipedia's Runaway Train article which is a crucial fact about this event. --KJRehberg (talk) 04:25, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There are no facts there, only a disambig page. It even explicitly states the train article has no information about runaway trains. Kind of a cool Soul Asylum song, though. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:41, July 8, 2013 (UTC)
It's better than nothing until someone writes a page about runaway trains, never going back. --KJRehberg (talk) 04:44, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Not so sure it's better. Doesn't the word "driverless" and the description of the accident make it clear enough, without needing a Wikilink to anything? InedibleHulk (talk) 05:04, July 8, 2013 (UTC)
I'm sorry, I removed the links before seeing this discussion, but they were kinda useless. pm (talk) 05:11, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There's an expression in French, « rouler à un train d'enfer » (literally "to roll as a train of Hell", although figuratively "take off like a bat out of Hell" is closer). « Un train d'enfer » was used in 1991 in Québec in a popular song title. Un train d'enfer. A train of Hell, indeed. 2001:5C0:1000:A:0:0:0:1DA7 (talk) 23:59, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe add Ozzy Osbourne's Crazy Train to this playlist? Then again, runaway train really should be created as an article about rail safety instead of pointing to a list of train songs. K7L (talk) 16:03, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In North American usage, the person operating a train is an engineer, not a driver. "Driverless" sounds dumb. How about, "... the train, operating without its engineer, ..." There would have been a crew of at least two, an engineer and a conductor. It's possible there would have been a brakeman (or someone with another title) but that would be rare these days. --plaws (talk) 21:08, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The engineer was alone. pm (talk) 21:30, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Someone changed it to "unattended" after I deleted "driverless". Perfect! --plaws (talk) 22:24, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This accident is very similar to a film I saw a couple of days prior to the accident... Unstoppable (2010 film) ; a train with no operator on board, running down a mainline, going to derail on a curve in the centre of a town. -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 01:02, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"One man" operation

It's notable that this train operated with a one-man crew. That's VERY uncommon and with good reason (I am not a railroader and not in their union!). You don't want your commercial aircraft operated by a single pilot and you don't want your 78-car hazmat trains ... actually any trains that big ... operated by a single crew-member. Needs to be section on that, I think. --plaws (talk) 22:30, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Handbrakes

http://www.radio-canada.ca/regions/estrie/2013/07/07/007-hypothese-accident-megantic.shtml this article mentions 5 handbrakes on the engines as well 10 handbrakes on the cars. I don't see it in the Wikipedia article but I'm not adding it since I'm tired and already pulled an oops earlier. I think it should be added but I'm leaving it to someone else. --Daffydavid (talk) 06:01, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

les freins à air de toutes les locomotives et de tous les wagons étaient activés, de même que les freins à bras (mécanique) de 5 locomotives et 10 wagons: that's air brakes for all locomotives and all cars, plus (mechanical) handbrakes of all 5 locomotives and 10 cars. I don't know which oops you're talking about [edit: oh, right, your reading issues :)], but who cares. Feel free to add it. pm (talk) 06:06, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Added with ref. --Daffydavid (talk) 04:56, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Other problems with MMA

A background section with some info on the MMA would be nice. I started one today, but I didn't have much time and couldn't finish it. I'll try again tomorrow. In the meantime, this is a french source for another MMA accident last month in the same place. pm (talk) 06:09, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A previous incident of an unattended train running away and a fuel spill: "In February 2010, three MMA locomotives were left unattended by their crew in Brownville Junction, Maine, according to American records. As the air brakes failed, the locomotives rolled away down the hill, causing a crash, a sprained knee and spilling more than 1,100 litres of fuel onto the ground." Per [Global News]. Is that worth mention? Edison (talk) 01:27, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Very much so. pm (talk) 01:43, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]


http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/07/11/lac_megantic_railways_history_of_costcutting.html

Affected area

I have two wildly different maps: one from radio-canada and the other from cbc. I'm leaning towards the latter, because it's much more conservative and reports talked about four blocks leveled. If nobody objects, I'll change my map to correspond to cbc's. pm (talk) 18:30, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's possible the reality lies between the two... the Métro supermarket is outside the area on CBC's map but is widely reported as unusable or gone. L'Echo de Frontenac has been posting names of destroyed businesses on Twitter (although some, such as the pharmacy, are setting up temporary sites elsewhere). Still not enough info to update the town's article Lac-Mégantic to indicate whether individual buildings in that article such as the old bank and the centre sportif are still extant, unusable or gone. K7L (talk) 18:57, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
And again another one from the star, which I like much better, although it might strain my skills to reproduce. pm (talk)
Perhaps the discrepancy is that a location may have been affected enough to put it out of business without levelling the structure. Damaged or unreachable isn't necessarily "levelled". K7L (talk) 16:24, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The cbc map is in fact a kml with google maps with the caption "Inaccessible zones". So the two contenders for the affected areas right are really radio-canada and the star. The latter has a much smaller area for "scorched earth" and I'd go for it if there's no objections. pm (talk) 16:40, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The map from the Star better reflects the burned(destoyed) area if we compare it to photos of the damage. --Daffydavid (talk) 17:22, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've updated the image, but I'm having issues. It looks like the full-size image is still the old one, although all the other resolutions are fine, and the thumbnails are created from the full-size. I've tried reuploading the image, which fixed the previous version, but gave me the same problem with the new one. Same thing when reverting. Adding &action=purge to the full-size url gives the right image. Does anyone have a clue or should I take this somewhere else? pm (talk) 15:26, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"No wounded. They're all dead"

I hesitated before adding this quote because I didn't want to get sensationalist and heartless. However, I think it describes really well what those people standing around in the hospital might have felt at the time. If anyone feels this is inappropriate, remove it at once. pm (talk) 19:47, 8 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think it's inappropriate but I did add the 128-injured total immediately after the quote. Readers can make of that what they like. Perhaps the injuries were mostly minor and the hospitals were not receiving anyone with serious injuries or burns. Roches (talk) 14:23, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Inconsistent with Railway air brake?

The description of the accident in today's papers states, in essence that without a locomotive running which was attached to the parked train, the air pressure decreased and the train started rolling, leading inevitably to the accident once the engine stopped running. The article Railway air brake states that railway airbrakes are "fail-safe," in that it requires full pressure in the air cylinder on each car to release the brakes, and that a decrease in pressure in the air line from the locomotive to the cars would in fact apply the brakes. The system described in the news reports sounds like the "straight pressure" system, which generally is obsolete, since the brakes fail if the pressure drops or if the air pressure line breaks, leading to an accident from a single point of failure. Any clarification from railway industry publications would be very helpful in the article, but for now any original research about how the airbrakes work or should have worked should be kept out of the article. Edison (talk) 00:08, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've been wondering the same thing. I've used to drive a truck with air brakes and they work the same as you describe. If an air-line breaks, if the truck is turned off, anything that results in loosing air-pressure, causes the brakes to engage and remain engaged. Dtaylor05 (talk) 00:42, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The brakes apply when air pressure in the brake pipe drops so shutting down the locomotive would have only increased the braking effort, not decreased it. Your interpretation of how the system works is incorrect Edison. Reread the article and review the part about the triple valve.--Daffydavid (talk) 07:46, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Updated railway company statement [2] "While the governmental investigation of the accident's cause has largely prevented MMA from completing its own investigation, one fact that has emerged is the locomotive of the oil train parked at Nantes station was shut down subsequent to the departure of the engineer who had handled the train from Farnham, which may have resulted in the release of air brakes on the locomotive that was holding the train in place". Note the phrase "air brakes on the locomotive" rather than "air brakes on the train". Does this mean that the train was being held only by the straight air brakes on the locomotive and not by the continuous air brakes on the train? Also, what was the reason for leaving an engine running? Biscuittin (talk) 12:13, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

According to this source: "the use of the air system makes the brake "fail safe", i.e. loss of air in the brake pipe will cause the brake to apply" so there is definitely something odd here.--Brian Dell (talk) 15:35, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

From [3] “I don’t see leakage as a problem,” said Forrest Van Schwartz, a veteran railroader and managing director of Global Transportation Consultancy LLC, based in Madison, Wisconsin. “If the brakes were properly applied before the locomotives were shut down, the loss of air might be one or two pounds over, say, an hour,” he said — a negligible effect on a system that is normally kept at a pressure of about 90 PSI. K7L (talk) 15:43, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That would mean this train used a completely out-dated and dangerous technology. Train air brakes are normally built fail-safe and every car has own brakes. If the brakes are not fail-safe against pressure loss this is a very serious design flaw. This needs to be cleared up. 46.245.207.58 (talk)
No the brake system is not out-dated it is the system used all across North America. There is something we don't know yet that hasn't been released to the public in order for this train to run away. Loss of train line pressure means additional braking pressure. There is more to it but I suggest you read the section on Railway air brake so I don't have to explain it here.--Daffydavid (talk) 20:24, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
There are several types of air brakes. First, locomotives have a direct brake. This is as simple as it sounds: The driver opens a valve, which pushes air into the brake cylinders. If you shut down the compressor, this brake will release slowly as the system looses air. It will, however, stay applied as long as the compressor is running, if nobody changes the position of the valve.
Second, there's the train brake. It consists of a single air line which both supplies air to the cars and controls the brakes. Each car has a reservoir, which gets filled up as soon as there is air pressure. If the air pressure in the brake line drops (because the engineer opens the brake valve or because the brake line is torn apart), the brakes are applied on all cars, using the air from the reservoir of each car. However, this will only work for so long: At some point, the reservoirs of all cars will be empty due to some air loss, and the brakes will release themselves. Note: Even with an engine attached and running, you cannot fill the reservoirs of the cars without releasing the brakes! (unless you have an additional air supply line, which many passenger trains have, but not freight trains)
Bottom line: You cannot keep a train stationary forever using only the air brakes of the train. However, by keeping the locomotive running, you can use the direct brake of the locomotive to keep the train stationary. But if somebody shuts down the locomotive and nobody applies the hand brakes, things will go wrong after some time... Note that I'm not an expert for US and canadian railroads, but the air brakes are very similar all over the world. --Kabelleger (talk) 20:29, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No you can't keep it stationary "forever" but a very long time(certainly longer than this took to happen). But this is turning into a forum so I'm done. --Daffydavid (talk) 20:41, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The article currently has original research regarding the brakes, with text and conclusions not in the supporting reference: " Because the air brakes were apparently not able to operate in a fail-safe manner,[not in citation given] this allowed the train to move downhill from Nantes into Lac-Mégantic once the air pressure dropped in the reservoirs on the cars.[20]" We should not be acting as an investigative task force by inserting observations in the article which do not come directly from reliable sources. Can a source be found which states " the air brakes were apparently not able to operate in a fail-safe manner," given that there are still other possibilities, like too few handbrakes were applied, or the air brakes were inadvertently released while the engine was being shut down, or the air brakes were released by persons unknown? Also, a reliable source is needed as to how long the air in the brakes would normally keep the brakes supplied after the engine was shut off. Failure in under 2 hours is pretty short per railroad employees who have posted comments on news stories, but we need identified reliable sources from the railroad industry.

Edison (talk) 15:20, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Edited to remove OR. Failure in under 2 hours is pretty much unheard of. The problem with much of the information is finding RS material. Many of the quotes are being misinterpreted or are in fact bad information despite coming from what is considered a RS. The problem with comments made by railroad employees on news stories is that some of them clearly didn't pay attention in rules class and have no idea what they are talking about. The TSB report is what we need to wait for. --Daffydavid (talk) 16:24, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

why such strong explosions?

isn't crude oil rather sluggish as an explosive? why such powerful blasts? anyone know? Cramyourspam (talk) 00:25, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Nothing much has been reported on the explosions themselves (although I swear I've read something about a possible collision with something that had propane in it somewhere, can't find it). However, put oil in a tank, pressurize it and make it rupture, and you have an aerosolized flammable liquid flying through fire. It might not have been strictly speaking an explosion, but I don't blame them for saying that a deflagration of this size felt like an atomic bomb. pm (talk) 01:50, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The firefighters mentioned bleves at the various press releases -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 07:09, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's acombination of several factors - the tank is heated, its content boils, building up pressure. The pressure can be relieved by a security valve, which leads to more fire. Then the tank becomes even heater, and starts to contain more gas or even a mixture of oxygen and boiling fuel. Finally, the tank ruptures, due to the suddenly lower pressure the remaing fuel boils at once and by mixing with air it explodes. So-called fuel-air bombs use the same principle. Two videos which show the force of that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sl-JgyQA7u0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf3WKTwHpIU

--46.245.207.58 (talk) 20:33, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is unlikely to have been a BLEVE unless the train hit a compressed gas tank. According to OGP Risk Assessment Data Directory, Report No. 434 – 7, International Association of Oil & Gas Producers, March 2010, "BLEVEs of hydrocarbons up to butane or perhaps pentane are credible. ... BLEVEs of heavier hydrocarbons such as crude oil or petroleum do not occur." It was probably a fuel-air explosion. --Heron (talk) 12:37, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think it'll be necessary to wait for an investigation to be sure about this. Many Canadian gas stations have very large propane tanks and many stores (gas stations, convenience stores and hardware stores) have racks of barbecue-sized tanks. Some restaurants have propane tanks even in built-up areas. Roches (talk) 14:23, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The train's movements before the incident

The article just states that the train left Montreal, then stopped for the night at Nantes. It would be less than a 3 hour car trip. The article should state what time the train left Montreal, when that info becomes available, since that would bear on why it was necessary to stop for the night rather than continuing, along with info as to how many hours the crew had worked that day at whatever tasks. The size of the crew should also be included: driver(engineer) only, or a 2 person crew. Edison (talk) 01:58, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think it was established that the engineer was the only one on the train. I think trains don't have drivers anymore. As for the route, the information is starting to be available, like the fact that it had gone through toronto earlier. The full route will likely be available eventually. pm (talk) 02:06, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't for a minute believe that this train was operating with an engineer only - that's very uncommon. Engineer and Conductor would be the minimum on most railroads in North America. VIA Rail Canada has some trains that operate with a single crew member in the cab, but that's a different situation. As for the route of the train, remember that this train would have been handled by multiple railroads - the MM&A does not serve North Dakota or wherever this unit train originated ... and it makes little difference. --plaws (talk) 21:14, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry to disappoint: Deadly train derailment puts focus on solo-operator crews. pm (talk) 21:24, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand something else. The train left Montreal and stopped in Nantes, going east. Normally, the engines are at the front of the train, meaning they would reach Lac-Megantic first, right? So, what happened to the locomotives if the 73 cars separated from them, rolled into town at 99 km/h, and derailed? Did the locomotives whip through town without derailing? Did they turn down a different track? The story doesn't make sense unless the engines were at the west end of the train and the cars separated going into Lac-Megantic ahead of the engines, and that makes no sense either. So, I have to assume that the locomotives are in the mess in Lac-Megantic. Some light on this, anyone? GBC (talk) 01:53, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The accounts say that the locomotives were running ahead of the tank cars. The cars got separated from the locomotives before reaching the town. The locomotives reached the town first and passed without derailing through the site where the tank cars derailed moments later. In this interview (in French), the official MM&A spokesman assigned to the French-speaking media says that the locomotives were waiting on the tracks beyond the site (he doesn't tell where and how they stopped) and he also said that's how it was possible to confirm that their manual brakes were still applied even then. (That raises other questions, like if the tank cars were not even weighing on the locomotives and if the manual brakes of all five locomotives were applied, yet the locomotives were running at 100kmph, then if those brakes could not even hold the locomotives themselves, that braking system must be quite useless to hold a train.) The spokesman also said that the train engineer was already in Lac-Mégantic at the time of the derailment and he went to the site and separated some underailed cars from the rest of the train and he used some equipment to pull them away from the fire site (he doesn't say if he did something to the locomotives). -- Asclepias (talk) 04:32, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lac-Mégantic, Quebec; and other related articles...

Please remember to update Lac-Mégantic, Quebec to make sure the summary of this incident is up to date, and to add to that article, information about the town that is now being featured in derailment coverage (like how MusiCafe was central to town life, etc) -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 08:13, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also please remember to update related articles on regions impacted by this event (such as the oil spilled into the river and evacuations of nearby communities) -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 09:49, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Musi-Café is not a notable historic landmark in Mégantic and would not merit encyclopaedia coverage outside of its proximity to this specific derailment. Tourism to this region seems to be based mostly around hunting and fishing. No one is going to drive 100km east of Sherbrooke just to find a bar unless they have some other reason to visit the region. The Lac-Mégantic article is about the town, not about the derailment. Update what's already covered on those pages (for instance, if a historic building already listed is gone), but don't add derailment info that merely duplicates this page. K7L (talk) 14:51, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

DOT 111

Can someone start an article on the DOT-111? the type of oilcar involved in the derailment. -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 08:14, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No idea myself about the subject or whether it's notable, so I've posted your request to Wikipedia:WikiProject Trains/Todo/Write#Write - unpowered rolling stock and Wikipedia:Requested articles/Applied arts and sciences/Transport#Rail transport--A bit iffy (talk) 08:39, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I have started the article as a sub-section of tank car. Please expand it if you can. Biscuittin (talk) 12:51, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

From the TSB newsconference, apparently, this is called TC-111/TC 111/TC111 in Canada instead of DOT111, and generally is called 111-class/111 class -- 76.65.128.222 (talk) 00:57, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tampering or terrorism?

Some reports suggest engines might have been tampered with. There have been plots to derail trains in Canada before, and a number of suspicious explosions such as West Texas and Mobile Alabama oil barges that have not been explained. How often do idling locomotives just catch fire because of a oil or fuel leak? Redhanker (talk) 21:12, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Quite often, apparently: Since 2005, he said, the unit has extinguished four fires on MMA trains, including the one Friday night. Each fire was caused by problems in fuel or oil lines. Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity. pm (talk) 21:29, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Le communiqué: "Pour la libération immédiate : Daté : Dimanche 7 juillet 2013 : 16H15 EST..." (MMA press release, the French goes downhill from there, per [4]). Hmmm... last organization I heard demanding "immediate liberation" from the yoke of Canadian oppression was the FLQ, the terrorist front from the October Crisis of 1970. Maybe this MMA thing is a foreign terrorist organisation looking to harm Canadian civilians? K7L (talk) 22:36, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Please see WP:NOTFORUM. If you wish to speculate, do so elsewhere. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:46, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Besides, that's just a bad translation of the phrase "for immediate release" as typically shown on press releases. DS (talk) 12:50, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

CNN is reporting that the police say there was tampering. Daniel Case (talk) 23:13, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The allegation appears to be originating from Ed Burkhardt, chief executive officer and president of Rail World, the parent company of the Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway. No idea why a police officer would repeat this as fact, given that it was largely debunked a day ago, and this is the only instance it's been presented as anything but a quote from the railway owner. It looks primarily like an attempt to evade Res ipsa loquitur#Exclusive control civil liability (basically, if the railway were the only ones to have control of that train, the initial assumption in a civil suit is that they're the only who could be responsible for what has happened).
Certainly, the SQ is treating this as a criminal investigation "on an unprecedented scale" - and this from the outset, solely due to the amount of damage. Then again, a mere suspicion of "criminal negligence causing death" would be grounds enough for police to investigate.[5] I doubt that any of these "tampering" or sabotage theories are officially supported by the SQ at this time, and the claims by the railway itself are already in the article. There isn't enough in this one source to justify changing that. K7L (talk) 23:27, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If terrorism were any sort of concern, would the railroad routinely leave a train unattended for hours on the main line with the engine running and the door unlocked? See Attractive nuisance doctrine. Edison (talk) 15:06, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The railway would likely do exactly that, but then refuse to inform the municipalities (or provinces/states) through which these trains pass of what hazards or flammables are aboard or provide them with freight timetables, citing "security reasons". See security through obscurity. K7L (talk) 14:55, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

video

CBS posted this video courtesy of Adrien Aubert. http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50150531n 108.56.212.179 (talk) 23:10, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That's appeared on various sites, including Radio-Canada news and YouTube. I think someone already tried to link to the youtube version from this article but was reverted by an obnoxious 'bot. K7L (talk) 23:12, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Stating the country in the lead

The reference to Canada has been deleted from the lead twice.[6][7] Why is is not pertinent to make it clear where in the world the event happened? It is a basic trivial fact and provides context for the entire article, as indicated in Wikipedia:LEAD. It is also usual to mention the country in the lead in similar articles, e.g.:

But sometimes it is left out, perhaps by mistake:

  • 2013 Buenos Aires rail disaster: "…in Buenos Aires Province, near Castelar station about 30km (19 miles) from Buenos Aires."
  • Fairfield train crash: "…between the Fairfield Metro and Bridgeport stations." The lead of this article didn't clearly mention the city, let alone the state or country, until I added it. Fairfield is a common place name, by the way.

So why shouldn't we provide this context in the lead here? —sroc (talk) 23:39, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Buenos Aires is already widely known enough that it isn't necessary to spell out its role as the capital of Argentina. All of the other examples you list are obscure places, which is why they're spelled out. K7L (talk) 23:43, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I presume you don't think the town of Lac-Mégantic is well known on the same scale.
The Canadian province is the most well-known "Quebec", but there are others, including a community in Montana, a village in Connecticut, several villages in England including in County Durham. Is there really any harm in including the word Canada in the lead to make this clear? —sroc (talk) 00:07, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would also point out that several places are named in the subsequent section, but the names of their respective countries are not identified. The only such references are the "United States-based" railway and "the Canadian government", leaving the reader to read between the lines to understand in which country each event has taken place, unless they can infer it by knowing the place names already. —sroc (talk) 00:11, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Nothing outside Canada is particularly well-known under the moniker "Québec", much like Mexico City isn't going to be immediately presumed to be Mexico, Maine or Mexico (village), New York. It's a bit of a stretch to presume Québec is going to be assumed to be in England. K7L (talk) 00:12, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But is there any good reason to exclude this information? —sroc (talk) 00:14, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Already in the infobox. K7L (talk) 00:17, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Infoboxes are not meant to exclude information from the article and not a good reason for leaving contextual information out of the lead. —sroc (talk) 00:21, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

More examples:

You'd expect people know where Ontario, Amsterdam, Buenos Aires (again), Moscow, Washington DC, Massachusetts and California are, but we say it just the same. —sroc (talk) 00:28, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I've added the comma after "Canada" per Wikipedia:COMMA. —sroc (talk) 01:59, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Canada has been removed from the lead again. Biscuittin (talk) 18:26, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's entirely unnecessary to say "Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, Canada"; it is also long and clumsy for reading. Some examples have been provided above of articles that use the country's name in their leads; however, only three are relevant, since the others don't show [Town], [Province/State], [Country]. Of the three that do, they're anomolies; one does not normally see "[Town], [State], United States" or "[Town], [Country], United Kingdom"; it is usually just something like "Chicago, Illinois", "London, England", "Branson, Missouri", etc. If anyone wants to know what country Quebec is in, all they need do is look a few millimeters to their right and see it in the infobox. Alternately, they can simply click on the linked word "Quebec". --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 18:38, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
What does the AP Stylebook say to do? Abductive (reasoning) 19:11, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
in my experience the average US college student can not identify any Canadian province. Leave the word Canada in the article lead. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.78.45.67 (talk) 03:10, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That's not a valid argument for its inclusion. --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 03:29, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
That's not a valid argument for its exclusion. —sroc (talk) 05:53, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wikipedia isn't designed to cater solely to US college students. That said, there should be consistency across Wikipedia articles and, presently, there isn't. Not every location is as widely known as Toronto, New York, London, or Moscow. For example, does everyone know where Kazan is? How about Sana Rudravaram‎? No? Then perhaps the standard should be full identification, including country (for all relevant articles including US subjects). Does anyone have a MOS reference we could point to? I don't have time to wade through it right now. Taroaldo ✉ 03:38, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The latter list of examples are all the rail accidents from the templates since 2008 in major (well known) cities. They don't all use [city], [state/province], [country] format, but they all specify the country in the lead in some way, shape or form. All but one have an infobox listing the country, but this doesn't justify leaving it out of the lead altogether. This is also important to ensure that the article reflects a worldwide view ("Think from a global perspective") and doesn't assume knowledge based on a particular region. —sroc (talk) 05:44, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've just had a look through the MOS and found nothing to address this point, so I've posted a query at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(miscellaneous)#Place_names_and_specificity. Personally I think it is obvious that a proper encyclopedic style requires the country to be mentioned in this situation. When I see "Lac-Mégantic, Quebec" without the country, it makes me think (whether it's true or not) that the writer is attempting to inject a separatist POV into the sentence. --174.88.134.93 (talk) 06:15, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is quite an impressive discussion so far, I didn't think separatism would come into play so soon and I'm hoping we can dispense with the Nazis. Can we agree that formally specifying the country with the name of the city (as Lac-Mégantic, Québec, Canada) might be unwieldy, but that mentioning the country in the lead is an important piece of information?
If so, then what I'm seeing right now (deadliest in Canada) is a rather good compromise and I'm happy with it. pm (talk) 11:29, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, it doesn't need to be in the form "Lac-Mégantic, Québec, Canada", as long as Canada is mentioned, as is consistent from the examples shown above. In this case, the reference to Canada (three sentences later) isn't as proximate to the name of the town as the other examples (which are usually in the same sentence, except the 2010 Moscow Metro bombings), but I would think what we have now is clear enough. —sroc (talk) 11:55, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm fine with mentioning the country once; no need to repeat it to the point where it's in the infobox twice and in the text body repeatedly. K7L (talk) 14:45, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Check the French article, it's good that way. "Lac-Mégantic, Québec (Canada)." If it's good in the French article then it's good here.99.199.237.60 (talk) 14:47, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

File:Lac megantic affected area.png

This image shows damage to the north and west of Rue Frontenac. From every image I can find the damage starts pretty much right where the red star is located. Anyone else see this or is it just me?--Daffydavid (talk) 05:40, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

See Talk:Lac-Mégantic_derailment#Affected_area above. pm (talk) 14:32, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Name of Engineer relevant?

It says in the referred article that the name of the engineer is Tom Harding. Futher on in that article it says that the train company refuses to hand out the name of this person. A contradiction? Is the name correct? In any case, i dont think the name is relevant, and it should be removed. Franke 1 (talk) 20:38, 10 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I removed the name. Taroaldo ✉ 04:59, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The name appears again in the section "Aftermath". It also appears in the cited reference. Should it be removed from the Wikipedia article? Biscuittin (talk) 08:05, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The engineer has been mentioned in the media quite a lot: he apparently risked his live to move cars out of the fire, he's being blamed by the MMA, was fired yesterday and police is thinking about prosecuting him. So yes, as the last person who operated the train before the disaster, I think he's important. pm (talk) 11:37, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
You need to be careful with some of those claims... they're being made not on the basis of police investigation, but by the owner of the railway in order to deflect attention from himself and the company. If unit train loads of flammables are being left unattended at the top of a 1.2% 14km grade overnight on a near-daily basis, that decision was made by the company and not just unilaterally by one engineer. The company has flip-flopped from engineer-as-hero to engineer-as-villain very rapidly, but likely to save their own miserable hide in a criminal negligence investigation. K7L (talk) 15:04, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not commenting on whether all this happened or not, I'm just saying he's notable in the context of the article. The original question was whether the name of the engineer was relevant. pm (talk) 15:20, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Its good to see that the name now have been removed. Lets wait and see how this occurrence unfolds, bearing in mind that a criminal investigation is on-going, and under such circumstances, caution is always adviced. Maybe in the end he will be a hero, and in that case he might even have his own article. But for now, it should be left out. Franke 1 (talk) 15:17, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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