(The Canadian Press circulated the following story by Lori Fazari on August 6.)
WABAMUN, Alta. — More than 100 angry protesters blocked a Canadian National railway crossing Friday to express their anger at what they called the company’s poor response to a freight train derailment and oil spill on the lake where they live.
Cabin owner Don Goss said CN appeared to be more worried about getting trains running again than they were in cleaning up what some have described as an environmental disaster. “There’s an army of CN vehicles here with equipment to fix their track, and yet we’re fending on our own here,” he said.
“The trains are rolling and there’s virtually nothing happening as far as cleanup. They’re telling us there is, but we’re not seeing it.”
RCMP officers monitored the protest, which broke up Friday afternoon after the provincial government issued an environmental protection order on CN.
Company officials also held a two-hour meeting with residents and protesters Friday after failing to show up to a scheduled meeting earlier in the day.
Yellowhead Tory MP Rob Merrifield emerged from that closed-door gathering to say the company was making it a priority to keep the oil slick from spreading closer to the Sundance generating station, which provides one-quarter of electricity in the province.
Merrifield said there was concern that if the oil got too close, the station might have to be shut down.
“The priority will be to boom around that so that doesn’t take place,” he said.
CN spokesman Jim Feeney, who did not return calls for comment earlier in the day, stopped briefly after the meeting to talk to reporters before rushing off.
“There are containment booms in place and work goes on in keeping the oil away from the sensitive areas of the lake, including the hydro plant,” he said.
Merrifield said the mood of the meeting was calm.
“CN has finally got the message. They’ve got to start communicating with residents. These people are upset because no one was telling them the straight goods.”
Even Goss seemed somewhat placated by what CN officials said.
“We’re confident that we’re making the best of a bad situation,” he said. “There’s a plan in place.”
However, residents of communities around the lake, 65 kilometres west of Edmonton, stressed they would not hesitate to block the rail line again if they aren’t satisfied with how the company is responding.
“We do feel better that we have been assured that action is commencing,” said Marianne Tessier, a cabin owner at Seba Beach who is cutting her vacation short and returning home to Edmonton.
Sharon Latimer of Seba Beach said she was also cutting short her summer vacation, adding she plans to put in a claim to CN to recover money she paid for her children’s now-cancelled sailing lessons.
The provincial order commands CN to do what is necessary to clean up the spill and report progress to the province and the public. Failure to comply results in fines or other penalties.
“The citizens here have some justifiable concerns,” said Environment Minister Guy Boutilier.
“We are doing a complete investigation.”
The province also announced it has hired ecological experts David Schindler and Ron Goodman to advise it on the best way to mitigate the long-term hazard of the spill on the environment.
They said the company is waiting for specialized equipment to handle the cleanup.
“This is an unusual oil,” said Goodman, former head of environmental research at Imperial Oil. “It’s very heavy and it’s viscous.”
Schindler said one solution may be to burn off the oil from affected wetlands. That would kill off wildlife and vegetation now, but allow them to rebound in the future.
“That’ll have to be traded off versus the need for immediate habitat,” Schindler said, adding that while cleanup on the water could take two to three weeks, cleanup on the shoreline could take until next summer.
Residents were still bringing in oil-slicked water birds for cleanup at the village arena. Hugh Wollis, a biologist with Alberta Fish and Wildlife, said volunteers had cleaned up several dozen birds, but had to destroy some of them.
Wabamun Mayor Larry Burton said the village, which takes its water from the lake, is having it trucked in and has a five-day supply in its reservoir. He said he doesn’t know what the long-term solution will be if tests show the lake water is unsafe.
Officials were also urging residents not to go out in the lake in any kind of watercraft – not even to areas unaffected by the oil – out of fear it could make the slick spread.
The train derailed Wednesday when 43 of 140 cars left the tracks. Some of the cars contained bunker fuel oil, used in liquid asphalt and to power barges and ships. Fifteen of those cars, as well as a car full of lubricating oil, began to leak into the lake.
Meanwhile, CN was dealing Friday with another derailment near Squamish, B.C., where nine cars of a freight trail plunged into the Cheakamus River canyon.
One of the derailed cars was loaded with about 51,000 litres of sodium hydroxide, a highly corrosive liquid.