Derailed tankers checked

Thursday, Jan. 13, 2005 | 11:17 a.m.

Inspectors have not found any indications that Wednesday's flood-caused derailment of a Union Pacific freight train north of Moapa has caused any environmental contamination, officials said this morning.

There were initial reports that the derailment, about 65 miles north of Las Vegas, had included six tankers that carry hazardous chemicals.

But this morning, Cindy Petterson, public information officer for Nevada Division of Environmental Protection, said that though there were 15 railroad cars in the water, only one was listed as containing a hazardous material -- a flammable solid. She said she was not immediately able to provide more details about the contents other than that "it had already been off-loaded so the only possibility was that there was some residual content."

She said sampling did not indicate there had been any releases of hazardous material.

"We'll probably do more extensive testing after the waters recede," she said.

Union Pacific reported the derailment to the state environmental division shortly after 10 a.m. Wednesday, Petterson said.

The floodwaters in Meadow Valley Wash, a torrent fueled by rain and melting snow in Lincoln County into the Muddy River, had undermined the tracks where a train had been parked for days, Union Pacific spokesman John Bromley said.

No one was on the train at the time.

Fearing that the chemical tankers containing chlorine, sulfuric acid and liquid petroleum might have been damaged in the derailment, the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection sent a hazardous management team to inspect them.

"They were empty tankers that had contained non-hazardous cargo," Bromley said of cars involved in the derailment. A freight car full of kitchen appliances also went off the tracks, he said.

Each chemical tanker carries a placard describing what is inside, even if it is empty of chemicals, Bromley said.

Eric Matus of the state Environmental Protection Division said that Union Pacific had assured the haz-mat team that none of the tankers was full. The train had left Los Angeles heading for Ogden, Utah. It was put on a spur several days ago when a bridge about 30 miles south of Caliente washed out, Bromley said.

Late Wednesday afternoon, the state's haz-mat team was ferried by helicopter into the area, Matus said.

"It would take an enormous amount of chemical to be a risk downstream," Matus said Wednesday. "There's probably a low-level of risk, if any."

Clark County Emergency Management staff, who are manning an Emergency Operations Center 24 hours a day because of the avalanche risks in the Spring Mountains and flooding in Overton and Mesquite, were notified of the potential hazardous cargo by the state Environmental Protection Division.

In the wake of the environmental destruction, the Association of American Railroads, the lobby group for railroads, has restricted Union Pacific's shipments from Los Angeles north to Santa Barbara and east to Moapa Valley indefinitely.