Last patrol of 2013 - day 7 (4 photos)
December 11, 2013
Riverkeeper Team
Kingston to Ossining:
Cold – not a soul on the Walkway Bridge at Poughkeepsie today.
The massive stone crusher and loading docks at the Tilcon quarry just south of Poughkeepsie. The stone is sent south to the metro area by barge.
Below, a train carrying crude oil from the Bakken oil fields in N. Dakota is seen passing through downtown Newburgh.
I don’t think the public is aware of the human and environmental risks this type of cargo presents.
These trains, often consisting of some 80 rail tank cars, run south from Albany through many west shore communities to various points south, and then return.
This is the same type of rail car and product which derailed and exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Canada, on July 6, killing 47 people.
There was another derailment and fire on Nov. 8, 2013 in a wetland near Aliceville, Alabama.
Recently, and closer to home, on Dec. 6, 2013 a train carrying empty crude oil tankers returning to N. Dakota from Philadelphia crashed into a truck at a rail crossing in West Nyack.
Just this Tuesday, another CSX train loaded with crude oil derailed just south of Buffalo, in the Town of Cheektowaga, N.Y. CSX officials said the train was traveling from Chicago to Philadelphia.
The transport of N. Dakota crude oil through the Hudson Valley began increasing dramatically in late 2012, with plans at the start of this year calling for increasing capacity at the Port of Albany to accommodate an additional 1,000 cars per month, according to an Albany Times Union story published early this year, and with CSX freight at the time announcing the investment of some $26 million to increase track capacity from Albany to northern New Jersey, one place where oil refineries accept the crude oil. The article also mentions CSX was planning to add a second track so it can eventually handle as many as five tanker trains a day carrying 400,000 barrels of crude.
Storm King Mountain. Railroad along its base and the Storm King Highway across its face. Too bad this road was ever built.
If you look closely you can see the white streaks below the Peregrine falcon nests under the large overhang (above the CSX service truck on the railway).
