Police respond to derailment - Date/Photographer unknown.

31 July 2012

Train Derailment Near Poplar Point

Poplar Point Manitiba - Portage RCMP responded to the derailment of 12 Canadian Pacific (CP) rail cars, Sunday, northeast of Poplar Point.
 
RCMP Sgt. Line Karpish did confirm that a member from the RCMP attended the derailment north of Highway 26 near Road 17W at about 6:00 p.m. on Sunday.
 
"It was basically a CP freight train that derailed. There was no hazardous materials involved and no one was hurt," said Karpish.
 
Jerry Berriault, regional senior investigator in the Winnipeg office of the Transportation Safety Board (TSB), confirmed that the 12 cars were empty when they left the track.
 
"There were 12 cars derailed, it was a westbound CP freight train. They were double stacked container cars with nothing loaded into them," said Berriault.
 
At this time the TSB is in the early stages of an investigation into the derailment.
 
"This was during a severe storm and a weather incident so we're going to be looking at previous history in the area and weather reports historically to see if anything is related. We'll also be looking at the local event recorder of the train for train speed and stuff like that," said Berriault. "We look at all aspects and then use a process of elimination to huddle down to where we should focus the investigation. At this point we are just strictly gathering information."
 
Following the completion of the investigation a public report will be issued highlighting any safety concerns that arose during the investigation.
 
"The goal of the safety board is to identify cause and contributing factors and then make recommendations to eliminate safety deficiencies so those type of things don't happen in future," said Berriault.
 
Robin Dudgeon.