(The following article by J.C. Reindl was posted on the New Britain Herald website on August 11.)
PLAINVILLE, Conn. — With hammers and rail saws, railroad crews Tuesday were busy handling two giant tanker cars loaded with corn syrup that derailed from the tracks late Monday.
By early afternoon, eight workers were gathered around the isolated train of three black tankers resting on and around a middle track in the industrial railroad yard paralleling Cronk Road.
The axles of two of the tankers lay bent and mangled, their steel wheels burrowing into the dirt.
Each tanker was filled with 200,000 pounds, about the same weight as a blue whale, of corn syrup, said town Fire Marshal Larry Sutherland, who investigated the scene for safety risks.
No spillage occured as a result of the derailment.
The incident was reported to have occurred sometime Monday night, when the tankers were part of a larger train that was attempting to switch tracks, according to Sutherland.
“It was a three mile-per-hour derailment,” Sutherland said.
Railroad crews Tuesday were preparing the tankers to be individually lifted from the tracks by a giant crane, he said.
Information on where the tankers were headed before the derailment and where they will be transported once the crane arrived was unavailable by press time.
The tankers were owned by the Archer Daniels Midland Company and were being operated by the freight carrier Guilford Rail Systems.
The train was traveling on the Guilford Line.
Representatives from Archer Daniels Midland Company and Guilford Rail Systems could not be reached for comment.
There were 32 train derailments in Connecticut from 1990 to 2003, according to the Federal Railroad Administration. There had been no derailments as of this May.