Four Years After Lac Megantic

Trains still roll through the very center of Lac Megantic, the Quebec town where a runaway oil train derailed and exploded in 2013, killing 47 immediately and leaving devastation and depression that would claim several more lives in the years that followed. Four years later, federal responses to oil train safety issues in both Canada in the US have been deeply disappointing, with the exception of Canada’s rapid phase-out of the dangerous DOT 111 tank car.

In Plainfield, Illinois, a derailment just a few days before the 4 year anniversary underscored how little has changed–and in the case of oil trains getting longer, conditions are getting worse…