FELA Lawyer News Blog

ROODHOUSE, IL – Eight rail cars of a Kansas City Southern Railway train occurred about 8 a.m. Tuesday morning, November 16, when the eastbound train being pulled by four engines slowed to make the curve onto southbound tracks at the Roodhouse Rail Yard. Eight empty grain cars behind the engines derailed to the west of the tracks that run parallel to U.S. Route 67 through Roodhouse.

Roodhouse Police Chief Steve Speeks said Thursday that the superintendent of the city’s Street Department continues to keep West Rowe Street blocked from traffic because of road damage caused by Tuesday morning’s derailment of a 144-car Kansas City Southern Railway Co. train.

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The damage was caused when some of the empty grain cars fell from the rail bridge overpass/viaduct onto the road below.

Seventeen tankers carrying anhydrous ammonia were immediately behind the cars that derailed. Those tankers remained upright and none of the chemical leaked.

Fire Chief Terry Hopkins was keeping an eye on the wind direction. The town’s school was 200-300 yards north of the accident site. “When anhydrous ammonia leaks, a very little of it causes respiratory distress,” he said. The chemical is used as a fertilizer by farmers.

An official statement Tuesday from Kansas City Southern Railway Company spokeswoman Doniele Kane said nine cars had jumped the track. The following day, though, she revised the count to eight.

The main line was cleared at 2:35 p.m. Tuesday, and the cars were moved by 8 p.m. Tuesday, she said.

“The cause of the derailment remains under investigation,” Kane said in an e-mail Wednesday.

Resident Flo Bryant had a front row seat to the derailment. Several of the cars fell into her backyard. “We have actually had a spill here before that leaked. I can’t remember what the chemicals were but they evacuated the area,” she recalled. One rail car nearly fell on top of an abandoned house a block from her, but Bryant has no intention to move. “We’ve lived her 35 years; we’re really kind of used to it.”

Police Chief Steve Speeks said witnesses who saw the train just before the accident reported the train was barely moving. The train was pulling 144 cars; 61 of them were loaded.

Speeks said Thursday that Kansas City Southern Railway Company personnel had the eight empty grain cars that derailed moved to the Roodhouse Rail Yard, and that they were not salvageable.

“My understanding is one car they thought had derailed and was damaged had not derailed, and was salvageable,” Speeks said.

The eight cars that derailed were just four cars ahead of a fully loaded anhydrous ammonia tanker car, and more loaded anhydrous ammonia tankers were among other cars farther back in the line.

Speeks said his officers and Roodhouse Fire Department personnel remained on site until 8 p.m. Tuesday, after the derailed cars all had been moved to the Roodhouse Rail Yard.

The cause remains under investigation at this time.

Source:
TheTelegraph.com

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Published by FELA lawyer Gordon &amp Elias, LLP

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