Prescott: Alcohol a likely factor in 2021 freight train collision, according to TSB report [Video]

The Transportation Safety Board (TSB) says alcohol likely played a factor in a head-on crash between two freight trains nearly three years ago that seriously injured a crew member and disrupted freight and passenger rail service going into the Labour Day weekend in eastern Ontario.

The TSB released its final report of the crash that took place at the train tracks in Prescott, Ont. near Edward Street on Sept. 2, 2021. The crash site was located about 95 kilometres south of Ottawa.

The report says train 532 received permission from the rail traffic controller to enter the north main track and had reversed the switch to the industrial spur.

The RTC did not obtain the required location from the crew on train 149 and did not know the train’s exact location. When the controller received the request from train 532 to enter the north main track, the report says, he developed a “mental model” that train 149 had already gone by the …