La Broquerie Reeve says train derailment was best case scenario

The Reeve for the Rural Municipality of La Broquerie says Thursday evening's train derailment was a best case scenario.

Ivan Normandeau is referring to what happened around 7:15 pm at the intersection of Highway 210 and Road 36 North, northwest of the community. Normandeau says he is thankful the derailment did not happen in town and that it is only blocking one intersection. Further to that, he says there was no liquid spillage as most of the cars were empty.

CN has confirmed that there were no injuries, leaks or fires and that there is no risk to the public. According to CN, the cause of the incident is under investigation. CN thanks local emergency services for their assistance.

"There's no casualties, it didn't hit any vehicles," adds Normandeau. "This was probably the best scenario. Didn't have to evacuate any houses and we really can't complain."

La Broquerie Fire Chief Alain Nadeau says there was at least one explosive car, but it stayed on the track. Had it derailed, Nadeau says the evacuation zone would have been one mile. The derailment happened approximately three-quarters of a mile from La Broquerie.

Normandeau says he was at his kid's hockey practice on Thursday when he received a phone call, alerting him to the derailment. He was quickly informed that the cars were largely empty and that it was just a matter of waiting for CN to get there to start its investigation and begin cleaning up.

Normandeau commends the work of their fire department and Emergency Coordinator. He notes their emergency crews are constantly preparing themselves for scenarios such as this one. In fact, he says about two months ago, they ran through an exercise for a train derailment in town. 

"This was exactly what we were prepared for," he says. "We have an emergency plan in place that we review every year and we have an emergency officer that's there that if anything does happen he will be on site and give us advice for the council itself."

Normandeau assures the community that though train derailments are something he hopes never happen, their emergency personnel are prepared. 

With files from Corny Rempel and Kenton Dyck