(Ken Silva, Headline USA) The Federal Railroad Administration is “still investigating” the 60,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate that disappeared from a train car a year ago, according to the Cowboy State Daily.
The local newspaper reported on March 25 that the “The FRA investigation is still being finalized,” and that the FRA’s findings are “pending potential enforcement actions.”
“FRA’s investigation is focused on both the railroad and the shipper,” the agency reportedly said. “Enforcement action would be taken against any party which violated rail safety regulations.”
The ammonium nitrate, which can be used as fertilizer or in explosives, was shipped by rail from Wyoming to California by the firm Dyno Nobel, and the cargo was lost en route.
The railcar loaded with the 30 tons of chemical left Cheyenne on April 12, 2023, and was empty when it arrived two weeks later at a rail stop in the Mojave Desert, California. Dyno Nobel suspected that the chemical fell from the covered hopper car during transit due to a leak through the bottom gate during one of its multiple stops.
According to Dyno Nobel’s press statement, the material, transported in pellet form, was being transported in a covered hopper car similar to those used to ship coal when it fell out of the car en route to Saltdale, approximately 30 miles from the town of Mojave.
According to the Cowboy State Daily, officials still suspect that the ammonium nitrate was leaked, as opposed to being stolen.
“As we have previously indicated, all the available evidence suggests this was a leak that occurred over the course of transportation from origin to destination,” Mike Jaixen, a spokesman for the Union Pacific, told the newspaper. “Such a leak is unlikely to pose any risk to public health or the environment.”
Congress passed a law on securing the handling of ammonium nitrate in 2007, authorizing Homeland Security “to regulate the sale of ammonium nitrate to prevent and deter the acquisition of ammonium nitrate by terrorists, and for other purposes.”
Ammonium nitrate is a potent explosive, capable of wreaking death and destruction on an unimaginable scale. The April 19, 1995, Oklahoma City bombing was one such example—a homemade bomb containing ammonium nitrate that had been constructed and detonated with devastating consequences.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
