(The following article by Paul Rogers was published in the San Jose Mercury News.)
SAN JOSE, Calif. — More than 11 years after a train derailed near Dunsmuir and dumped thousands of gallons of weed killer into the state’s top fly-fishing river — killing every fish, plant and insect for 38 miles — the railroad industry argued in federal court Thursday that California has no authority to impose safety rules designed to prevent another spill.
Appearing before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, industry attorneys said the California Public Utilities Commission violated federal law in 1997 when it issued rules to require more training, better track standards and oversight of the way rail cars are configured.
If states set their own rules it would lead to a chaotic mix of regulations, said Maureen Mahoney, a lawyer for the Union Pacific and Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroads.
“There is tremendous potential for inconsistency,” Mahoney said. “It is very important for safety to have uniform rules throughout the system. You have people making up trains in Nebraska that are traveling all over the country.”
But attorneys for the PUC said federal law allows them to write tougher regulations for dangerous rail areas. Among those, they said, is the Cantara Loop, a 10-mile stretch of winding track in the hills above the Siskiyou County town of Dunsmuir, near Mount Shasta.
“The law does allow leeway if there are local safety hazards,” said PUC lawyer Patrick Berdge. “This is a special case. There are not many 14-degree curves in the nation.”
On July 14, 1991, a train operated by Southern Pacific derailed on Cantara Loop Bridge. It spilled thousands of gallons of metam-sodium, a pesticide, into the Upper Sacramento River.
Later investigations found the spill was caused because the railroad put too many empty cars near the locomotive and left heavier cars in back, causing a “stringlining” that pulled the middle of the train off the tracks while rounding a curve. The railroad, later bought by Union Pacific, paid $75 million in fines and settlements.
A month after the PUC passed new safety rules, the railroads sued. In 2000, U.S. District Court Judge Thelton Henderson threw out many of the rules. But he let stand one provision that said the Cantara Loop qualified as “a local safety hazard” under federal law — the first time that a federal court upheld such a designation — and said the state could require better-quality tracks there.
The state and the railroads appealed. If the 9th Circuit upholds Henderson’s ruling, it would set a national precedent that could encourage other states to pass tougher rules for dangerous areas, said Berdge. A decision is expected this summer.
Every year millions of tons of hazardous cargo, including chlorine gas, anhydrous ammonia, nuclear waste and pesticides are transported by train through California, usually without incident.
“The threat hasn’t gone away,” said Steve Evans, conservation director at Friends of the River, in Sacramento. “It’s very discouraging that the railroad industry fights the rules at every turn.”