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about

On July 6, 2013, an oil train derailed in downtown Lac Megantic, Quebec, killing 47 people. The accident was caused by a number of factors- poor maintenance of the engine, overwork and understaffing of the crew, and failure to apply enough brakes on a slope, or to keep the engine running to keep the air brakes effective. This song is written as a story being told by a passenger on Minnesota’s North Star Line, which shares some tracks with oil trains. Our first live performance was at a benefit concert for the defense fund of several railroad workers, including people who heroically worked to pull oil cars away from the fire. The railroad company scapegoated these workers to deflect its own responsibility.

lyrics

That oil train is three miles long, coming down the track
Its wheels are pitted iron and its barrels loomng and black
Those barrel cars are long as night and blacker than the crow
Riding from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico

Looks we’ll be here for a while, but then that’s nothing new
The North Star line is always stalled when the oil train comes through
It’s been that way these past few years ever since the boom began
Riding from the Bakken Shale or the Athabasca Sands

I heard there was an accident on a line out in Quebec
In the town of Lac Megantic was an oil hauler wreck
Said she came in without warning in the small hours of the night
There was screaming on the rails and then the air was full of light

Old cars on old tracks, just one conductor on the shift
The MMA had cut its costs, it was in the name of thrift
Switched off the job in Nantes, with an engine fire to kill
But those brakes gave out past midnight, she came rolling down the hill

And down in Lac Megantic at the new Music Cafe
The people crowded in to hear Bolduc and Ricard play
They were singing to the old Chansons, la vie et l’amore
Without thinking on the railroad tracks that ran outside the door
And she was moving fast and faster down the main line in the night
Her bells were deadly quiet and her wheels were smoking white
And the ground shook like an avalanche when she hit the bend downtown
The sky was raining fire when that oil train came down

The sun was rising red over the black and bloody smoke
The ground was still burning where the oil train had broke
For 47 dead and gone they’d ring the chapel bell
When she rode like the Pale Horseman and what followed her was hell

That oil train is three miles long, coming down the track
Its wheels are pitted iron and its barrels long and black
Those barrel cars are long as night and blacker than the crow
Riding from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico
Right through here is where they go; right through here is where they go.

credits

from In The Ruins They've Left Us, We'll Plant Gardens Still, released December 23, 2020
Vocals, Guitar, and Songwriting: Emmett Doyle
Accordion: Sam Adams
Bass: R Young

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Wooden Shoe Ramblers Minneapolis, Minnesota

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