Five people died and 40 more are reportedly still missing in a Canadian train derailment Sunday in Quebec. The train carrying crude oil derailed and exploded.
"This is an unbelievable disaster," said the Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
"This is a very big disaster in human terms as the extent of this becomes increasingly obvious", said Harper. "You know, it looks like a war zone here. A large part of the downtown has been destroyed, it's just, it is really just terrible."
"This is an enormous area, 30 buildings just completely destroyed, for all intents and purposes incinerated. There isn't a family that is not affected by this," said Harper who visited the derailment site.
Local news channels show massive flames and thick smoke emanating from the area. Several cars engulfed by the flames exploded.
"I don't want to get into numbers, what I will say is we do expect we'll have other people who will be found deceased unfortunately," said Lieutenant Guy Lapointe, a spokesman for Quebec provincial police, according to the Sky News.
"We also expect that down the line the number of people who are reported missing with regards to people who have actually lost their lives will be much higher," said Lieutenant Guy.
This accident again raises questions about transporting crude through rail lines. Due to limited pipelines trains are utilized. The derailed train was transporting oil from North Dakota's Bakken region to a refinery in New Brunswick.
The Canadian government has been looking into a proposal to build a cross-U.S. oil pipeline.
Canada is seeking approval for the Keystone XL pipeline that would transport tar-sands oil from Alberta to U.S. but Washington is taking time to give approval for the project due to environmental concerns.
The new pipeline will dramatically reduce rail usage for transportation of crude oil.
Canadian Railway Association has estimated that this year as many as 140,000 carloads of crude oil will be transported on its tracks, up from 500 carloads in 2009.
