Quebec lashes out at rail company

Luke Johnson

11 July 2013 23:09 GMT

Provincial and municipal leaders lashed out on Thursday at the company whose runaway train leveled the centre of a tiny Quebec town as more residents returned home and officials opened up a site for tributes to the 50 people who likely died, according to a report.

Police said they had found an additional four bodies in the wreckage of the town centre, bringing the total to 24. Another 26 people are missing and presumed dead, Reuters reported.

Quebec Premier Pauline Marois, whose government is making a C$60 million ($58 million) aid package available to the tiny community of Lac-Megantic, said the behaviour of the company, Montreal, Maine & Atlantic (MMA), and its president had been "absolutely deplorable".

Lac-Megantic Mayor Colette Roy-Laroche said company bosses should have arrived much sooner.

"I am truly shocked that he didn't get in touch with me as quickly as possible," Roy-Laroche said of railroad chairman Ed Burkhardt.

She said she had not met with Burkhardt, who toured Lac-Megantic on Wednesday, apologised for the accident and said he felt "absolutely rotten about it".

The driverless MMA train was hauling 72 tanker cars of crude oil when it smashed into Lac-Megantic early on Saturday and exploded in a wall of fire that flattened dozens of buildings, including a packed bar.

Residents of Lac-Megantic are livid that MMA officials did not arrive sooner in their close-knit, lakeside town, where a third of the 6000 residents were told to leave their homes as the fires burned.

All but 200 have now been allowed to return home, although the devastated "red zone" at the centre of town is considered a crime zone and is closed to all but investigators, Reuters said.

Quebec police have gone over half the roped-off area, spokesman Michel Forget said, but the most difficult was yet to come because of the remaining oil and gas, as well as the tanker cars that had to be moved.

Some areas would take days and even weeks to get to, he said, adding he was confident police would find more of the missing bodies.

Burkhardt said on Wednesday he thought the train's engineer had not set enough hand brakes when he parked his train late on Friday at the end of his shift, allowing the train to accelerate downhill into town, where it derailed on a curve and exploded.

Reuters has been unable to contact the engineer, Tom Harding. A phone number listed for him in Farnham, Quebec, was disconnected and a Reuters reporter who visited his address found no one home.

"I heard yesterday and I was surprised, and saddened for him," said a neighbour living near Harding's two-story stone and vinyl-siding home with trees taking up most of his front lawn. "He is a nice man, a good neighbour," she said.

A death toll of 50 would make the accident the worst rail crash in North America since 1989, and Canada's deadliest accident since 1998, when a Swissair jet crashed into the Atlantic off the coast of Nova Scotia, killing 229 people.

The Canadian government said it would wait for the end of the investigations before taking decisions on rail safety.

"Railway safety regulations exist to ensure the safety and protection of the public," Transport Minister Denis Lebel said. "If these regulations were not followed, we will not hesitate to take whatever course of action is available to us."