Our View: Plan for disasters we hope will never happen

There seems to have been a great number of natural and man-made disasters in recent months.

Within the last 60 days, there has a fertilizer explosion in the tiny town of West, Texas, and in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, a train carrying crude oil crashed in the middle of town. Fifty people were killed, many of them vaporized.

These tragedies have prompted local officials to begin planning. They are considering: What would happen if such an event were to happen in Havre or elsewhere on the Hi-Line?

Trains generally slow down as they come through Havre, making the possibility of a Quebec-like crash in town less likely, but still possible.

But there are lots of potential problems looming throughout the area, and members of the Local Emergency Planning Committee are right to plan for the day we all hope will never come.

In each of the disasters that have struck the continent in recent months, communities that have planned for such an event have fared far better.

In West, many firefighters were apparently unaware of the vast amount of fertilizer that was being stored in the plant located in a residential area — across the street from a nursing home.

Local emergency preparedness personnel are way underfunded and are always spread too thin. It is encouraging that despite their problems, they are willing to expand their efforts to preserve the public's safety.

The Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway Co. is a fine corporate citizen and a valuable employer in our community, so is is a bit upsetting that company officials won’t reveal just how many oil cars from the Bakken fields go through Havre every day.

We hope they will work with emergency officials to coming up with a plan to deal with a worst-case scenario.

Havre is a safe place, and we shouldn't panic when we hear of disasters such as those in Quebec.

At the same time, it would be wrong to assume that nothing can go wrong. Things can go wrong.

Congratulations to local officials for spending time and effort on a plan we all hope there will never be a need for.