Calgary train collision second in a month for Canadian Pacific
CALGARY — Saturday's collision between two Canadian Pacific freight trains in the city's southeast was the second such incident to affect the Calgary-based railway in a month. Hundreds of liters of fuel spilled on August 21 after a CP freight train sideswiped another in mid-town Toronto a little after 5 a.m. — a collision that had the federal Transport Minister demanding answers. Saturday morning’s crash saw a westbound train roll into the rear of a second that was stopped on the tracks along Ogden Rd. and 50 Ave S.E. just after 9 a.m. — a short distance from the railway’s corporate headquarters — sending locomotives off the tracks and scattering shipping containers across the ground. The crew of the crashed train was allegedly based out of Medicine Hat, Metro learned on Monday. The crash occurred on a curve just inside the limits of nearby Alyth Yard — uncontrolled territory that requires trains to operate at what the Canadian Rail Operating Rules defines as “reduced speed” — one that will “permit stopping within one-half the range of vision of equipment.” While a railway spokesperson only said the crash was caused by ‘human error,’ fatigue among Canadian Pacific crews has been under Transport Canada scrutiny this year. In January, federal railway inspector Todd Horie ordered Canadian Pacific to change crew rest and dispatching procedures in British Columbia to address crew fatigue issues.
