Railroads Lift 'Red-Alert' Status

The nation’s railroads have lifted a “red-alert” status, assumed earlier in connection with hazardous materials, according to the Association of American Railroads.

Since Sunday afternoon, the U.S. rail system has been taking greater measures to ensure security, including the suspension of shipments of certain materials that it declined to identify, AAR said.

The organization says it has consulted with “our customers and appropriate national security agencies to balance our nation’s economic needs and national security requirements,” and, a spokesman said, "to assure ourselves that we were taking the proper precautions."

To that end, railroads have been checking employee rosters against a list of potential threats supplied by the FBI. Security patrols have also been stepped up at critical facilities.

Security has also been tightened at AAR’s Web-based information network, particularly in regard to the movement of certain materials.

MSNBC said that shipments by rail of hazardous materials like ammonia fertilizers and sulfuric acid had been suspended. Shipments of those products were switched to trucks, according to the news agency, but now can be expected to return to the railroads.

There has been intense scrutiny placed on truck shipments of hazardous materials since it was found that several individuals had obtained fraudulent licenses to haul hazmats.

AAR said that it was activating a rail freight industry crisis center, to operate “on a 24/7 basis, monitoring developments and coordinating responses with the highest levels of national security agencies.”

“The industry has brought in security experts to assess railroad security under the new global terrorism threat,” the association said in a release.

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