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Lac-Mégantic: ‘This thing did not just happen’ because of engineer, lawyer says

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MONTREAL — Despite the results of an investigation that found no one person is responsible for last summer’s fatal Lac-Mégantic train derailment, Thomas Harding is facing a potential life sentence in prison for his role in the crash.

Harding, the engineer who operated the freight train just hours before it exploded in downtown Lac-Mégantic, was arrested in May and charged with 47 counts of criminal negligence causing death. Two other employees of the now-defunct Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway were also charged with criminal negligence that day.

An investigation by the Transportation Safety Board, which released its report on Tuesday, found that while Harding and his colleagues bear some responsibility, there were 18 factors that contributed to the deaths of 47 people that night.

“This thing did not just happen because of Harding,” said Tom Walsh, Harding’s lawyer, during an interview with The Gazette. “This is very unfair. There’s a whole series of factors that had been building up over the years so that it was an accident waiting to happen.”

On the night of July 5, 2013, Harding parked a freight train carrying 7.7 million litres of crude oil in Nantes, just outside of Lac-Mégantic. Before retiring for the night, he applied seven hand brakes to secure the train. The TSB determined that didn’t provide sufficient force to stop the train should its main braking system fail — which ended up happening. Harding also didn’t properly perform a hand-brake effectiveness test, the investigation found.

After one of the locomotives caught fire, the train’s brakes bled air until they could no longer hold it in place. Without the right amount of hand brakes locked down, the freight train began careening toward Lac-Mégantic, and ultimately into the downtown core.

But the TSB contends there were numerous other causes behind the accident — a lax safety management culture that appeared rampant at MMA and weak oversight from Transport Canada, to name a few. In fact, the majority of the 18 factors are unrelated to the performance of Harding’s duties on the night of the derailment.

Specifically, the report states that MMA did not provide effective training or oversight to ensure its employees understood the rules governing train securement. The rail operator was also found to be missing key processes in its safety management system.

Though MMA has been targeted by several class-action lawsuits, chairman Ed Burkhardt has not been arrested or charged with any criminal offences.

“Before laying all of the blame at Harding’s feet, the Crown prosecutor should consider some of the individuals involved in the 18 delinquencies,” Walsh said. “But criminal negligence is a strange thing. If you are criminally negligent and it contributes in any way to an accident, you’re guilty. Twenty other people may be guilty as well, but you’re guilty.”

As of Tuesday afternoon, Walsh hadn’t yet spoken to Harding about the TSB report.

“I know he feels the same way as me, that the Crown prosecutor hasn’t made any distinction for human error,” Walsh said. “It’s been hard on him, but I think this report will at least help give context when it’s time to select jurors at his trial. Context is everything here.”

Police deployed a SWAT team to arrest the longtime locomotive engineer in May, strong-arming him in front of his family before carting him off in handcuffs. Sources say the tactics were necessary because Harding posed a suicide risk.

MMA railway traffic controller Richard Labrie and Jean Demaître, the company’s manager of train operations, are also charged with 47 counts of criminal negligence causing death.

ccurtis@montrealgazette.com

Twitter: titocurtis


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