A member of the National Transportation Safety Board is calling tank railroad cars an “unacceptable public risk”.

The cars have come into the spotlight after two major accidents in the last year.

The DOT-111 cars were involved in a derailment in Casselton, North Dakota that caused a massive fire that burned more than 24 hours.  An accident involving the cars in Lac-Megantic, Quebec caused a massive explosion that killed 47 people and destroyed 30 buildings.

The NTSB has been issuing warnings about those cars and calling for their replacement or retrofitting since 1991.  Efforts to create actual tougher regulations for railcars didn’t get underway until almost 20 years later.

“Right now, there is so much uncertainty that people aren’t going to make investments in safer cars and they’re going to keep running these crummy cars and killing people,” Representative Peter DeFazio of Oregon said.

Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad said they are not going to wait for increased regulations from the NTSB.  They put out a call for bids for 5,000 new tankers with a higher level of stability and security.

The NTSB is concerned because of how often oil cars pass through or very close to cities and towns.