Over the last three years, you’ve probably heard about the dozens and dozens of actions the Federal Railroad Administration and our partner agency, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, have taken to make transporting crude oil by rail safer.

Stronger tank cars.

A new, electronic braking system.

Sharing quality information with first responders.

Better track inspections.

The list goes on.

_{Photo credit: Harvey Henkelmann via Wikimedia Commons. Photo for illustrative purposes only.}

But we know that safety is something that has to be addressed every single day. And that is why we have said from the beginning that when we see a need for us to act to improve safety, we will not hesitate.

Today, we took another action – FRA issued a directive to owners of certain tank cars with possible flaws.

The potential flaws are in the welds at the bottom of the tank car where two components allow for product to be offloaded. Some of the welds do not meet federal safety regulations or industry specifications.

The good news is these flawed welds have been found in only a small portion of the U.S. tank car fleet that were manufactured by American Railcar Industries and ACF Industries between 2009 and 2015.

These tank cars – DOT 111s – are used to transport a wide variety of products, everything from crude oil to corn syrup. 

The directive instructs tank car owners to take immediate steps to determine if one of these tank cars is in their fleets and, if so, to inspect and repair those tank cars if necessary.

Effective today, tank car owners must:

• Identify within 30 days whether they hold any of these tank cars in their fleets and report those to FRA.
• Prior to any of these tank cars being put into service, visually inspect to verify there is no visible leak from the welds, and confirm that the tank car is in safe condition for transportation.
• Put the identified tank cars through ultrasonic and surface inspections to fully examine the welds. If flaws are detected, the tank cars must be taken out of service immediately and repaired.

Tank cars with confirmed flaws that transport hazmat must be tested and fixed faster than tank cars that transport other products. The tank cars that are in storage currently and have flaws have more time.

As FRA considers enforcement actions against the tank car manufacturers, we hope that industry will join us in scrutinizing the practices of these companies and do their part to add pressure to identify and fix these tank cars as quickly as possible.

We know that our work to keep rail workers and communities along railroad track safe is never done. Today is part of that effort.