Rail officials say Austin area prepared for crash like one in Bexar

AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF ^ | Wednesday, June 30, 2004 | By Asher Price

[Arrowhead1952]

2 still critical as train, gas cleanup goes on near San Antonio.

By Asher Price

AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

Wednesday, June 30, 2004

An insidious cloud of chlorine gas, released after a horrific train wreck just southwest of San Antonio, dissipated over Central Texas on Monday. Before it vanished, however, three people had been killed and dozens injured as the rolling fog, like something out of a horror film, slid through the area.

With major rail lines cutting through Austin and Central Texas, the transportation of such chemicals locally is common. But accidents such as the San Antonio one are rare, industry officials and regulators say.

"In the county I cannot recall a hazardous materials rail accident since I've been here," said Pete Baldwin, who has been Travis County's emergency management coordinator since 1991.

Autopsies confirmed Tuesday that two people found dead in a home near the San Antonio wreck died of chlorine inhalation. A 23-year-old conductor also was killed by the gas. Reports of a fourth death proved unfounded.

Two people remained in critical condition Tuesday, one with lungs burned by the gas. Today, workers plan to move the tank of chlorine, still a third full, to a nearby field, where they will pump the contents into a clean container, Bexar County spokeswoman Yvonne Escamilla said.

The county will evacuate about 12 families in the late morning and alert residents in a wider vicinity to remain inside with the air conditioning off as the tank is moved, she said. Access to the area near the accident remains restricted.

Officials from Hays, Williamson and Travis counties said several hazardous material teams could be quickly deployed should a similar accident happen locally.

The Union Pacific, Austin Area Terminal and Georgetown railroads are the main active rail tracks in Central Texas. The Georgetown track primarily transports crushed rock.

"We're not presently hauling any hazardous materials," said Rick L'Amie, a spokesman for Capital Metro, which operates the Austin Area line. "We're primarily hauling rock and lumber."

Mark Davis, a spokesman for Union Pacific, said a "good variety" of material is transported through Austin. Chemical transport accounted for 14 percent of Union Pacific's $11 billion commodity revenue in 2003, the company's most recent analyst fact book said.

"It's not a super-double secret what they're doing," said Jeff Hayes, Williamson County's assistant emergency management coordinator. "They've got the appropriate storage containers and all the markings along the line. It's a day-to-day business, and people trust the railroad that nothing's going to happen."

In Texas, a leading state in chemical production, trains transported 38 million tons of chemicals from plants in 2002 and delivered 21 million tons of chemicals to Texas facilities, said Tom White, a spokesman for the Association of American Railroads.

The term "hazardous materials" covers a host of substances that can harm human health or the environment if not managed properly. Those substances include diesel fuel, pharmaceuticals, solvents, fertilizers and even beer.

"In general, rail is a much safer way of shifting those substances than by highway. We don't share the right of way with millions of automobiles," White said.

He said rail companies transported up to 2 million carloads of hazardous materials in the United States last year. There were 25 incidents involving the release of the material as a result of a train accident.

Railroads shipped about 34,000 carloads of chlorine in 2002, White said. In 1996, the last time chlorine gas was released, a transient was killed when the Montana train he was riding crashed.

The accident in Bexar County occurred when a Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train pulling onto a siding was struck by a Union Pacific freight train. Forty cars, including four locomotives, derailed.

San Antonio Fire Department spokesman Randy Jenkins said that as many as 50 people suffered minor respiratory irritation, including visitors to SeaWorld about 10 miles away.

The bodies of the two women -- an elderly mother and her daughter -- were found about a mile from the crash site by search and rescue crews outfitted in hazardous material gear who went door to door after the crash.

Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board in Washington arrived Tuesday to examine railroad operations, tracks, signals and the hazardous materials involved.

[Redbob]

""In general, rail is a much safer way of shifting those substances than by highway. We don't share the right of way with millions of automobiles," White said."

Then what does he call those railroad crossing things?