COURTENAY, British Columbia — An effort to launch a class-action lawsuit against CPKC, Canadian National Railway, and other parties over the wildfire that destroyed the Village of Lytton, B.C., in 2021 was turned down Wednesday by the British Columbia Supreme Court.
But the Vancouver Sun reports Chief Justice Christopher E. Hickson left room for the case to proceed if the plaintiff addressed deficiencies in defining the standards of cause, common interest, classes of people represented, and how the case will be carried out that must be met to be certified as a class action.
Jordan Spinks, chief of the Kanaka Bar Indian Band, is the plaintiff in the suit; another representative plantiff recently died. As outlined by the law firm involved, the action is being brought on behalf of the individuals or estates who suffered injury or death in the fire, were displaced, or suffered property loss or business disruption. It claims the railroads and various equipment manufacturers were negligent in causing or contributing to the fire.
The June 30, 2021, fire killed two people and destroyed most of Lytton, displacing about 250 people. The town has yet to be rebuilt. The fire started near a CN rail line shortly after the passage of a CP train operated by CN (the railroads operate paired trackage through the area). While the Transportation Safety Board of Canada said it was unable to determine a train caused the fire, the incident ultimately led Transport Canada to impose new operating rules to address fire risks.
The village and its local regional district also filed suit against the railroads and Transport Canada earlier this year [see “Village destroyed by wildfire sues …,” Trains News Wire, June 22, 2023].
Do current diesel locomotives still through hot carbon out of their exhausts? I remember on the PRR when some loco’s were notorious for setting farmers fields on fire
Man, looks like Canadian civil law is as bad as the US. Even when authorities known to be critical of railroads finds no cause plaintiffs still sue and courts take the cases. There are just to many lawyers.
Not sure where you got the hot bearing idea from.
The loaded train would never had made it from Lytton to Burnaby with a hot smoking bearing, there are several hot box detectors over that distance, 248 km / 154 miles.
As well the investigation from the TSB concluded;
TSB finds no evidence train caused fire that devastated Lytton, B.C.
October 14, 2021 Trains newswire article
The official report from the Canadian Transportation Board stated;
TSB’s investigator inspected the train C73152-29 after it had been off-loaded and was secured in Burnaby, BC, looking for signs of hot bearings, burnt brake heads, built-up tread, and other potential fire-creating causes. No anomalies were noted. Transport Canada had also performed a safety inspection of the train earlier at the request of the RCMP and noted no anomalies.
If memory serves a coal train operated by CN for CP rail had a hot “bearing” which was noted to be smoking. This was the item sited, I do not believe it was more than a hot bearing which smoked. However, media tends to not do the background research.
Sun shining thru a broken piece of glass, a hiker tossing a cigarette. are also possible causes…just sayin’.
Those types of parties don’t have BILLIONS and BILLIONS of Canadian dollars. First rule of lawsuits is to spot a potentially culpable financial “whale” then go on fishing expedition. Muckrake enough and generate bad PR and possibly CN and CPKC cave and negotiate a settlement to get this case to disappear.
This case should have been thrown out due to lack of evidence.