(The following story by Josh Boatwright and Sabian Warren appeared on the Asheville Citizen-Times website on May 28, 2009.)
BAKERSVILLE, N.C. — A Mitchell County road closed by a train derailment has reopened, emergency personnel said this morning.
N.C. 197, which runs parallel to the tracks, had been closed at N.C. 226 after 20 cars on a CSX train derailed a little before dawn Wednesday. The incident happened in a rural area west of Bakersville. Some cars toppled to within feet of the North Toe River.
Mitchell County assistant EMS director Kathy Young said this morning the road had been reopened.
The road was closed because of the fear hazardous material in the cars would leak and “to allow them to get through some equipment to the tracks,” Young said.
Emergency workers were unsure what caused the derailment but found no sign an embankment or section of rail bed had given way, Mitchell County Emergency Management Director Eric Wiseman said.
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No one was injured. Three houses in the Red Hill community were evacuated as crews investigated whether hazardous material had spilled from the train.
The train’s cargo of ethanol and propane remained sealed in the cars, officials said.
CSX is investigating the cause and using heavy equipment to remove each car.
“We’re working right now on getting everything cleared up, which is certainly going take through (Thursday),” company spokesman Rob Sullivan said.
Crews must also repair the tracks, which were damaged in the derailment.
The train was traveling from Russell, Ky., to Hamlet, N.C, and had two locomotives and 89 freight cars. It derailed around the 36th car, Sullivan said.
Young said rain may have slickened the track enough to have caused the wreck.
“We’ve had a tremendous amount of rain this week,” she said.
Spruce Pine recorded 2.2 inches of rain this Sunday, with 1.3 inches falling Tuesday and Wednesday.
Most of the derailed cars turned over on or near the tracks, though a couple slid down an embankment near the swollen North Toe.
Emergency crews on the Yancey side of the river evacuated three homes before officials determined there was no danger from hazardous materials, Wiseman said.
They returned to their homes in the early afternoon, he said.