FERRYVILLE - A train derailed along the Mississippi River Thursday afternoon in southwest Wisconsin, leaving several cars overturned and jumbled along the bluff and two cars floating down the river.
Four members of the train's crew were transported to the hospital for medical evaluation, officials said Thursday evening. No hazard exists to the public, according to Jim Hackett, director of emergency management for Crawford County.
The derailment led to a response of 20 to 30 federal, state and local agencies.
The railroad company, BNSF Railway, is handling most of the cleanup and said neither of the two containers that landed in the river contained hazardous materials. Lena Kent, BNSF's general director of public affairs, said some of the containers derailed on shore contained paint and lithium-ion batteries.
"The batteries have not gone into the water," Hackett said in an evening news conference.
Hackett added that oxygen tanks were also cargo in the containers, which presents an explosive hazard. The containers that traveled down the river have been recovered and the cargo was paint, Hackett said.
Hackett said a fuel leak did approach the waterway but he was certain it wouldn't enter the river as crews deployed boom. A Vernon County hazmat team was on scene helping with the cleanup process.
"They are here in case the situation would take a turn," Hackett said.
Brandon Larson, the director of emergency management for Vernon County, said that if the batteries broke and lithium mixed in with the water, that would be a problem, but he was certain that all hazardous materials were on the bank and not in the water.
Officials said the derailment occurred about 12:15 p.m. near the villages of Ferryville and De Soto in Crawford County, about 30 miles south of La Crosse. State 35, which runs along the Mississippi River, is closed at the Black Hawk Bridge over the river from Iowa.
The train track is blocked in both directions without an estimated time for reopening. The cause of the derailment is under investigation, Hackett said, deferring its official release to the federal agencies and BNSF.
The cleanup process is expected to go on overnight. A steady parade of dump trucks dumped loads of gravel into the ditches near the train tracks along State 35 to create surfaces for heavy equipment to get to the overturned cars.
The overturned cars were right behind the engines, and seemed to be piled up at least three deep, with some of the cars crumpled.
Experts react to derailment's environmental impact
The land where the crash occurred is owned by the state of Wisconsin, but it's surrounded by the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge, which stretches 261 river miles from southern Minnesota to northern Illinois.
The refuge is a haven for a multitude of fish and bird species. It's a Wetland of International Importance and a Globally Important Bird Area.
Refuge manager Sabrina Chandler said that she wasn't aware of any contaminants from the train cars that would have made it into the river and would impact wildlife.
On Thursday, Chandler said she heard a small amount of paint was released at the impact site. On Friday, Chandler said she had learned the substance spilled was not paint, but coffee creamer.
She said she believed everything had been contained except for the two train cars that floated downriver. Because they were floating, she said she assumed they were not breached or cracked open.
On Friday, she said the floating cars had been located and would be recovered the next day.
Oladele Ogunseitan, a professor and chair of population health and disease prevention at the University of California-Irvine, said a worse situation was averted since the lithium battery cars didn't end up in the river. Ogunseitan’s research focuses on how toxic pollutants affect human and environmental health.
The main risk concerning the batteries is fire, because lithium-ion battery fires are “notoriously difficult to contain,” Ogunseitan said in an email Thursday evening.
But if the batteries are packaged correctly and not being charged — and if the weather is mild — fire shouldn’t be a concern, he said. Fire danger in Wisconsin has dropped since mid-April, when a hot, dry streak put most of the state at high risk.
Because the batteries do contain hazardous chemicals, responders should be careful cleaning them up and the cleanup operation should not leave residues that could seep into the soil or river, Ogunseitan said.
Maisah Khan, policy director for the Mississippi River Network, a nonprofit coalition that advocates for a healthier river, expressed concern about the environmental impact of the derailment.
“It is always problematic when things end up in the river that shouldn’t be in the river,” Khan said.
Bridge near site of derailment had been shut down due to flooding
Mississippi River floodwaters have inundated the area in the last week, causing the Black Hawk Bridge connecting the De Soto area and Lansing, Iowa, to shut down so local officials could inspect the dike that connects to the bridge.
The river is expected to crest there later this week at approximately 19.7 feet, hitting among the top five levels in the historic record.
The widespread flooding has also closed several locks and dams on the upper river, halting barge traffic.
Train derailments in Wisconsin
Wisconsin has had only one other train derailment this year, according to data through January from the Federal Railroad Administration. In 2022, Wisconsin had 11 derailments, and 15 in 2021.
Across the U.S., 1,173 derailments occurred last year and 1,099 the year before. That’s a significant improvement from past decades. For example, more than 8,000 trains derailed in 1977.
Americans recently followed weeks of news coverage on the Norfolk Southern train with hazardous materials that derailed in East Palestine, Ohio. Authorities ignited several of the cars to prevent an explosion and evacuated many of the residents in the area. Many residents have complained of headaches, rashes and other health problems, although government officials sayair and water testing hasn’t found dangerous pollution.
The railroad company, BNSF, is also known as Burlington Northern Santa Fe. It's one of the largest rail companies in the country, with 32,500 miles of routes and $25.8 billion in revenue last year. It operates in 28 states and three Canadian provinces, according to its website.
Its only Wisconsin route is along the Mississippi River, from St. Paul south to Illinois.
U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden, whose district covers the area of the derailment, said he and his staff are working with officials "to get answers on what occurred."
“My staff is traveling to the site, and Congressman Troy Nehls (TX-22), who Chairs the Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Rail, has also made staff available to assist our team. We will continue to monitor the situation and determine next steps.”
