Updated: Quebec Disaster: "You have to understand: there are no wounded. They’re all dead.”

[bluedigger]

52. 40 still missing after Quebec oil train crash

LAC-MEGANTIC, Quebec — A Quebec town devastated when a runaway oil tanker train ignited explosions and fires braced Monday for what authorities assured would be a rising death toll as fire crews tried to reach the hardest hit areas more than two days after the disaster. Five were dead and about 40 people remained missing.

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Worries remained late Sunday over the status of two oil-filled train cars at the scene. They were being doused with water and foam to keep them from overheating.

"This is an unbelievable disaster," said Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who toured the town Sunday and compared it to a war zone. "This is an enormous area, 30 buildings just completely destroyed, for all intents and purposes incinerated. There isn't a family that is not affected by this."

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The train's oil was being transported from North Dakota's Bakken oil region to a refinery in New Brunswick. Because of limited pipeline capacity in the Bakken region and in Canada, oil producers are increasingly using railroads to transport oil to refineries.

The Canadian Railway Association recently estimated that as many as 140,000 carloads of crude oil will be shipped on Canada's tracks this year — up from 500 carloads in 2009. The Quebec disaster is the fourth freight train accident in Canada under investigation involving crude oil shipments since the beginning of the year.

http://www.sunjournal.com/news/nation/2013/07/08/40-still-missing-after-oil-train-crash-quebec/1389863

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