One of NSC's switchers pull a string of new well cars from the paint shop Hamilton Ontario June 24 2016

Railink 4001 slides through the residential part of Hamilton Onatrio after switching industries in the north part. June 24 2016

The reputation of Canada's much criticized rail regulator is being further pummeled, both by its elected master and by the union representing lineside safety inspectors. The government revealed March 9th, 2016 that it has placed Transport Canada under special oversight by the Treasury Board, the country's guardian of public finances. The apparent cause was a hiring binge of rail safety inspectors without budgetary authorization. Then, a day later, the leader of the union representing those same rail inspectors called for a criminal investigation into Transport Canada's top rail regulators with respect to the special treatment they accorded the railway involved in the July 2013 oil-train runaway that caused the deaths of 47 people at Lac-Megantic, Quebec. In an unsettling revelation to Railway Age March 10, Christine Collins, national president of the Union of Canadian Transport Employees, said that Transport Canada inspectors had strongly recommended, in writing, that the now-defunct Montreal, Maine & Atlantic not be allowed to operate dangerous goods trains with just one crewman. The inspectors were overruled by at least one senior Transport Canada executive, said Collins. The executive left Transport Canada shortly after Lac-Megantic. "Our members told us they expressed their concern about the safety practices of the railway, but that their recommendations were disregarded by senior management," said Collins. Whoever overruled the inspectors by giving the lowly regarded company such special dispensation from normal operating rules "should be charged under the health and safety provisions of the Canada Labour Code," said Collins. No employee of Transport Canada has been publicly held to account for what proved to be a disastrous derogation from normal safety policy. Why MM&A was given special treatment has never been explained. Only the engineer and five other MM&A employees have been criminally charged under the Railway Safety Act and the Fisheries Act for negligence related to Lac-Megantic. Their trials are pending. Until now, it was widely believed that the MM&A train had slipped its automatic brakes, as air slowly leaked from the cylinders located on each of its 72 tank cars. In fact, only the locomotive's independent air brake was set to back up what tragically turned out to be an insufficient number of handbrakes set by the engineer before leaving the train unattended with the diesel engine running to maintain air pressure. When firefighters arrived to extinguish a fire in the diesel engine, they shut down the locomotive. It was not restarted before a railway employee left the train unattended, for the second time that night. Astonishingly, MM&A policy expressly forbade the application of automatic brakes before leaving trains unattended even trains parked at the top of a long downgrade, and loaded with hazardous materials. While contention clouds the notion that automatic brakes should be applied as a belt to the suspenders of hand brakes, there seems little reason to doubt that application of the automatic brakes would have, at the very least, delayed the Lac-Megantic runaway by several hours, enough time for the patrons of the town's nightspots to close, effectively vacating the downtown area.

This logical but nonetheless provocative proposition was advanced March 8th, 2016 by the Globe and Mail, which retrieved a heretofore-unreported, but critically important sentence in the 2014 investigation report (mea culpa on behalf of all journalists who covered this story): "While MM&A instructions did not allow the automatic brakes to be set, following a proper hand-brake effectiveness test, doing so would have acted as a temporary, secondary defense, one that likely would have kept the train secured, even after the eventual release of the independent brakes." In an apparently contradictory statement March 9th, Transportation Safety Board Chair Kathy Fox said: "Air brakes are known to leak; and the rate of leakage is completely unpredictable on any given railcar, at any given time. Since there are other solutions that are permanent, it is preferable that railways use ones that would ensure that equipment is secured for indefinite periods. For this reason, we object to the assertion that these "would have been a sufficient backup to the hand brakes." One indisputable assertion is that Canada's rail safety regime is in a state of internal disarray and public disrepute. Upon his appointment late last year, the country's new Transport Minister, Marc Garneau, promised to make reform of rail regulation a priority. Industry observers will be scrutinizing the government's March 22 budget for promises of investment in bureaucratic reform.  (Railway Age June 2016 - David Thomas).

 This sobering photo taken near Nantes, Quebec just one day before the incident, shows the actual five unit MM&A train locomotive consist enroute to Lac-Megantic. The lead locomotive was C30-7 (MMA 5017), the MM&A Remote Control Caboose followed by these four MMA six-axle units behind, is the actual fateful  lash-up of the runaway loaded crude oil tank train the following night just after midnight!  MM&A C30-7 50i7 was not allowed to be sold at the MM&A Assets Auction in 2014, and remains to this day stored in a siding not far from the diesel shop in Derby, ME.  (Photo CRO ARCHIVES 2013)

The Canadian Transportation Safety Board MM&A Accident Report:

After two years of absence, on June 4th 2016, the "Orford Express" returned to Eastman, QC.  Francois Jolin shot the train as it rumbled high above Lac D'Argent, Quebec led by FL9 (FLNX 484), which was repaired this Spring.  It was repainted and now has a Flexi-Coil front truck (replacing the Bad Order Blomberg lead truck), and is the only FL9 in the whole world to have one!  She is shown on the Central Maine and Quebec Subdivision with the passenger consist on June 4th. 

Marc-Antoine D'Astous photographed this sad scene of former Quebec Central owned units and equipment in various degrees of stripping and scrapping at East Angus, QC. on May 21st, 2016.  

Here are before and after shots of Alco Switcher JMG 9 by Andre St. Amant.

And as she looked last month.

Former Maine Central B23-7:

Former VIA Budd car and the ex-Long Island RR commuter car.

Former CP AMT FP7A 1300 was still standing.

Remains of one of the two nee-CP FP7A's (Ex-AMT 1302), and what's left of the other JMG locomotive.

Great Shot! In Sainte-Foy Quebec on May 21st, Dannick Fournier took this great shot from his personal Drone flying over the QGRY Henri-IV Yard.  The Ddiesel Shop area had several units outside and the two Retired RS18u's and bi-level passenger set from the tourist train now stored there.

Far from home rails, QNS&L SD40-2 314 was shot by Barry Silverthorn westbound on CN at Geddes Street in Belleville, Ontario on May 20, enroute to NRE in Illinois for Dash-3 rebuild, electrical upgrade, and repaint.

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