It’s hard to say what’s worse. The train derailment on April 15 that could have made an area west of Moosehead Lake look like East Palestine, Ohio, or the utter lack of care displayed since the crash by the company responsible for it, Canadian Pacific Kansas City.

As the cleanup continues near the village of Rockwood, where rail cars containing lumber and electric wiring derailed from a washed-out track and ignited in the woods, CPKC has been mostly silent.

Six train cars derailed April 15 near Rockwood, starting a small forest fire. The freight train was carrying hazardous materials, including pentamethylheptane, which is highly flammable and toxic to humans. Jackman-Moose River Fire and Rescue Department photo

What it has refused to say, however, has spoken volumes.

It won’t say, for instance, when the company last inspected the track for washouts. Tracks should be inspected once a week and, as the chief of safety for a rail workers union told the Press Herald, such washouts are a frequent occurrence in Maine at this time of year.

CPKC has also declined to answer questions about the hazardous materials being carried on the train, which included pentamethylheptane, a highly flammable and toxic chemical, and ethanol.

The rail cars carrying the hazardous materials did not derail but were next to those that did, and to the subsequent fire, according to the Greenville Fire Department, which responded to the incident. It could have been much, much worse for the people and environment of central Somerset County, who might have been looking at something like the catastrophic aftermath of the fiery derailment in Ohio two months ago.

Residents deserve to know just how close it came to disaster, and what can be done to make events like these less likely in the future, just as they should know whether the company transporting hazardous chemicals through their backyard is regularly inspecting the tracks or not.

If CPKC were in the business of conducting timely inspections of the track, we’d probably already know about it.

In addition, the company has not shown that it cares much about safety or the environment around the track it uses in northern Maine.

To start, CPKC failed to remove the rail cars containing hazardous materials in a timely manner, as it was asked to, instead leaving them at the derailment site until late last week.

Worse and more recklessly again, CPKC failed to empty the tanks in the derailed cars before removing them from the site, as they were directed to by the state Department of Environmental Protection. As a result, an estimated 500 gallons of diesel fuel spilled into the soil as well as nearby Moose River and Little Brassua Lake.

DEP Commissioner Melanie Loyzim warned CPKC last week that the company had “failed to meet department expectations regarding timing and response of clean-up activities in order to effectively mitigate impacts to the environment and public health.”

If the company doesn’t conduct the remainder of the cleanup in a “prompt, efficient and coordinated manner,” Loyzim said, the DEP could take over and charge CPKC for additional expenses.

Good. We hope the state keeps the pressure on CPKC to clean up the mess it caused, and doesn’t hesitate to sanction the company if it can’t comply.

We also expect the state to get answers to all the unanswered questions the April 15 derailment has raised, including those related to the critical maintenance of our railways and the regulation of transportation of hazardous materials through Maine wilderness – which could be ruined by one mishap.

We expect state officials to make sure that the important business of moving freight by rail is done with the basic safety and well-being of our communities in mind.

After the events of the last 10 days, we know we can’t rely on CPKC to do that.