Allison Martell

Reuters: Is the public kept in the dark about Canadian air safety issues?

ReutersAllison MartellComment

Regulators threatened to ground Canada’s Porter Airlines over safety problems in 2008, according to documents reviewed by Reuters, but the matter was kept secret for years - a sign, some critics say, of how little the public is told about the safety of Canadian airlines.

The documents, prepared by staff at the federal transport regulator, show that in early October that year, Canadian government inspectors scored Porter at only two on a scale of one to five, where five is best and three indicates compliance. The threat was first reported in the Canadian media in 2011 but the score and some of the reasons for it have not been previously disclosed.

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Reuters: CN Rail derailment numbers soared before recent crashes

ReutersAllison MartellComment

Canadian National Railway's safety record deteriorated sharply in 2014, reversing years of improvements, as accidents in Canada blamed on poor track conditions hit their highest level in more than five years, a Reuters analysis has found.

Canada's Transportation Safety Board (TSB) said on Tuesday that track failure may have played a role in CN's three recent Ontario accidents, which have fueled calls for tougher regulation. The agency said oil unit trains, made up entirely of tank cars, could make tracks more susceptible to failure.

Data obtained under access to information laws and analyzed by Reuters shows a broader trend, which has not been previously reported, and could pile more pressure on CN Rail to slow down trains or reduce their length. A crackdown on oil trains could raise the cost of shipping Canadian crude by rail.

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