In response to a class-action lawsuit, Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) filed its defense last week denying that it had any involvement in the oil train explosion in Lac-Mégantic in 2013 that took the lives of 47 individuals.
The railway company is facing a number of legal battles in relation to the incident, including a $409-million damages lawsuit by the city of Quebec and 10 insurance claims.
In July 2013, an unattended Montreal Maine and Atlantic Railway (MM&A) train of 72 tank cars carrying 7.7 million litres of oil derailed and detonated. The blast had destroyed most of the town’s center, forcing nearly 2,000 people from the area.
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The class-action lawsuit filed against the railway company also named MM&A and its engineer, Thomas Harding, reported The Globe and Mail. About 5,000 people and companies were behind the lawsuit, representing those who have lost loved ones, properties, and/or businesses during the accident.
According to CP, its responsibility for the train ended the moment it had handed over the cargo to MM&A from New Town, North Dakota to Montreal. MM&A was to carry it to the Irving Oil refinery in Saint John.
“[T]here is a transfer of liability when traffic is interchanged from a carrier to a connecting carrier,” the railway company said in the court document, citing Association of American Railroads legislation. “No CP locomotive or tank cars, no CP crew and no CP tracks were involved in the derailment.”
One of the plaintiffs’ lawyers argued that CP’s liability comes from its partnership with shipper World Fuel Services and its entities in the North Dakota rail hub.
The lawsuit purports that the oil shipment was mislabelled to conceal its volatility. In turn, the mislabelling allowed the railway company to use older, cheaper tank cars over the “poorly maintained and low-cost” MM&A route east of Montreal instead of a better-maintained line owned by Canadian National Railway.
The Globe and Mail reported that MM&A is currently in bankruptcy protection, and its assets have been sold.
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