First responders, agencies discuss derailment report

Representatives from local fire departments, emergency medical services, disaster response leaders and Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) met at the Carrington Fire Hall Monday night, September 30, for a debriefing on the Bordulac train derailment incident on July 5.

The meeting lasted around one hour and 20 minutes long, and was attended by over 40 persons. A meal was also provided for attendees prior to the presentation.

Ed Dankbar, Director of Emergency Management and Hazmat Response with CPKC, gave a slideshow presentation on the derailment, which entailed the initial response, hazardous material cleanup, and recovery efforts that have been accomplished over the last few months on site.

Dankbar went over the facts of the incident which began at 3:30 a.m. that morning on July 5, in which 26 cars from a CPKC train went off the tracks on the eastern edge of Bordulac. Of that total, 10 contained anhydrous ammonia, five with methanol and 11 with non-hazardous plastic pellets.

In the initial page to Carrington Fire and Rescue for response, Chief Ken Wangen described the scenarios that were running through his mind.

"We initially thought it was a locomotive fire," Wangen said. "And as we were gathering and mustering here, they were reporting that they could see the glow of the fire, for those of us that live in town."

Assistant Chief Jason Wolsky said that it became quickly apparent, about "two miles out," that it was much more of a dangerous situation than was foreseen.

"I think our biggest challenges were obviously with the crossings blocked and then the heavy rains we had, and trying to get equipment down to it," he said.

Wolsky said the department's main concern was getting the back half of the train disconnected and moved away from the wreckage, and trying to locate the front half of the train and other engines so they could confirm whether any fatalities occurred.

Andrew Kirking, Foster County Emergency Manager, added his initial impressions of the accident scene.

"I think the first test given to me was, go find the operators, your conductor and engineer," Kirking said, fearing that "they were hell bent that they just wiped this town off the map."

After getting those first drone photographs of the site, Dankbar said that the biggest unknown of the derailment was the contents of the burning and leaking cars, and the level to which they may have been compromised.

"The question became, between the anhydrous, the methanol and the plastic, what was on fire, was it all on fire, or was parts of it on fire? You've got to 'peel that onion', to get into it," he said.

One of the things responders discovered quickly was that access to the area of the wreckage, a wet slough north of the tracks, was "way deeper, way bigger and way wider than I ever anticipated," added Dankbar.

Wangen said, "I knew there was going to be the world coming to meet us, so I think one of the first things I said to our guys in the back was to start finding places to park the trucks that were coming."

Kirking contacted the North Dakota Highway Patrol, and arranged to put up roadblocks about one-half mile in either direction from the incident.

"Maybe we should have done a little bit more," he admitted.

Allyssa Lewis, paramedic with CHI Carrington Ambulance, said that when they were intially dispatched to the scene around 7:45 a.m., expectations were to have an ambulance for each person "in the direct line of fire."

"That's not possible here, but I felt like we did as good as we could have [for the resources available]," she said. "Our mutual aid and the other services that were there at the drop of a hat ready to send people and doing everything in their power to send us what we needed, was probably the biggest thing for us."

Within hours, Dankbar said that teams from across the Midwest and parts of Canada came to the scene, and the knowledge and know-how from responders and the fire department to tackle the spill and fire was "fantastic," in his words.

He cited, for example, the idea of pulling surface water to keep water suppression streams going and enable building pathways for investigating and addressing downed cars, along with dealing with respiratory protection and other issues.

"A lot of those folks are some of the unsung heroes of this, because those little things all made the big actions on site realistic," said Dankbar.

As responsibility for the site turned away from the local responders and towards the national and regional disaster response agencies, the incident turned from cleanup towards recovery.

One concern was air monitoring. While the hazardous gases largely remained near the site, it could have been much more of a problem had wind picked up and blew them towards populated areas.

The responding agencies were given the opportunity to assess what they thought went well with the response, what didn't, and what could be improved.

"I thought we had a good response," Wangen said. "When we sent in the first couple recon teams, they did exactly what Jason and I asked."

He said that luck played a factor as well, adding, "For everything going wrong, it's going right for us."

Wolsky quipped that for many of the members of the department, it was their second or third derailment. There were two other similar incidents in the recent past, one just east of the Columbia Grain elevator on March 2, 2019, and one within Carrington city limits on April 26, 2020.

"Of all things you don't want to be good at, it's these," he chuckled. "But I thought our communication on a local level at the beginning was much better compared to what it was over the last two."

Lewis agreed, saying, "There wasn't anything you guys did that you didn't include us or get feedback on, or vice versa. If we had an idea, you guys were open to it."

On the EMS side, Lewis was also grateful for the fact there were no calls for service on scene.

Several of the concerns mentioned were confusion around the implementation of "shelter in place" orders to keep the public secure in situations such as these, as well as the breaching of barricades meant to keep the public away from the incident site.

"When command makes the call that we want these roads blocked, it's back on us to get them unblocked," said Wangen. "These are long term events, and people were coming in crossing what should have been a closed road at the time."

Much of the barricade issue could be attributed to the lack of enforcement manpower at the city and county levels, Wangen added.

Foster County Commissioner David Utke praised the efforts of Kirking to keep county leaders updated on the developing situation.

"I know Andrew called me, maybe by 8:30, and gave me the best two-minute concise information with all the important stuff, resources that were coming in, so I could pass it along to the board," Utke said.

District 29 Representative Don Vigesaa said he and the district delegation of Rep. Craig Headland and Sen. Terry Wanzek also appreciated "being in the loop" on any developments.

"It was nice to be able to be informed right away that it happened, and then the updates kept coming," said Vigesaa. "I felt very comfortable with Ken and the whole crew here; everybody in this room did such an amazing job."

CPKC officials, including Hazmat and Emergency Response Officer Tony Houdyshell and Superintendent of Operations Ross McMahon, praised area communities for their commitment to the fight.

"Whenever an event like this happens, it puts a lot of taxation onto the supply chain of the community in a lot of different ways," Houdyshell said. "One point, we probably had 200 trucks easy. We ran stations out of diesel fuel. We ran everyone out of ice, and out of 12 packs of water at one point, especially during those first 36 to 72 hours."

"You don't see this type of coming together anywhere else," McMahon added.

Paul Stancil of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), listening in via Zoom call, said that what really went well was the cooperation and collaboration on multiple levels with CPKC.

"We had regular update meetings, very detailed coordination, that by the time we actually returned back out there, there were no surprises," said Stancil. "So we definitely appreciate that."

At the end of the meeting, Dankbar announced that Carrington Fire and Rescue would be receiving a $20,000 donation from CPKC for equipment.

Attendees were also given optional forms to fill out, where they could voice their written opinions on areas of improvement in regards to aspects of future disaster responses.