One of a persistent pattern of what authorities say are highly organized thefts involving international criminals targeting railroad cargo cars led to a cache of lithium batteries that were in transit catching fire early in the morning of June 3.
According to the Association of American Railroads, “In recent years, organized criminal groups have increasingly targeted the nation’s railroads using sophisticated tactics and technology to commit cargo theft.”
Over the last eight to ten months, an intensified crackdown on railroad cargo theft has been pursued by a multitude of agencies and entities, including the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad Police as well as the FBI and Department of Homeland Security.
In Southern California in particular, investigators have learned that the perpetrators have previously succeeded because they had inside information about railroad company operations.
Railroad industry sources and law enforcement professionals report that a substantial amount of railroad cargo theft takes place as a consequence so-called “inside jobs,” that is, with the assistance of those who work with the railroads themselves or as part of the rail infrastructure and support network. Individuals linked to cargo theft rings who have specific knowledge of the placing and timing of the shipment by rail of high-value goods is a common vulnerability and a major factor in the success of criminals who target rail cars for theft. Railroad police, the sheriff’s department, the San Bernardino Police Department, the Colton Police Department, the Rialto Police Department and the FBI have information that organized crime is employing individuals who assume relatively low-ranking and even temporary positions with rail companies or at rail terminals and rail yards to obtain information about what goods are being transported on which trains and in specific rail cars, together with information about when and where the trains are to remain stationary for an extended period.
Another vulnerability consists of spots where moving trains must slow considerably at curves or bends in the rail line, as is the case at certain spots along and at the bottom of the slope descending from the Cajon Pass near Devore. Trains are obliged to decelerate to navigate the sharp, sweeping curves along the track course, as taking the turns at too high of a speed poses a severe tipping hazard for heavy, multi-platform freight cars. Both the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway Company and the Union Pacific Railroad Company impose strict speed reductions for engineers driving trains at that location. This affords those on foot determined to jump onto a passing train an opportunity to do so, albeit with a certain degree of difficulty and some danger. Once on the trains, the thieves can break locks and seals on individual cars to gain entry to them and liberate their contents.
The highgraded investigations have revealed a substantial international component among the perpetrators, and occasionally evidence that those involved in the rings have immediate or removed family members or other contacts who have found work with the railroad companies, rail terminals or rail yards.
As a consequence of some of the known thieves being foreign citizens, many of them in the country illegally, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security and its subdivision, the Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, have become involved.
The international ring has become focused on the most valuable commodities shipped by rail. Among these are lithium batteries, which are of value due both to their utility and composition. Playing a critical role in modern technology, including smartphones, laptops, electric vehicles and renewable energy systems, lithium batteries are capable of higher energy density than traditional batteries. They are also expensive because of the materials involved in their components, primarily the lithium – sometimes referred to as “white gold ‘ – as well as cobalt, nickel, and manganese contained in their cathodes.
In the wee hours of Wednesday June 3, a rail car loaded with lithium batteries caught fire as it was being burglarized in the Cajon Pass, according to San Bernardino County authorities.
Crew members aboard a Burlington Northern-Santa Fe train bound for Chicago which had departed from San Pedro some two-and-a-half-hours earlier saw several people unauthorized to be traveling on the train who were engaged in burglarizing one of the rail cars. Shortly thereafter, flames were issuing from a container carrying lithium-ion batteries. It is assumed that the burglars, in upsetting the cargo, ignited the batteries. Banging, puncturing or dropping a lithium can compromise its internal structure, causing the separator between the anode and cathode to fail, creating a short circuit. This generates intense heat anda chain reaction, referred to as thermal runaway, which vaporizes the flammable electrolyte and produces highly combustible gases. As pressure builds up inside the cell, those gases are likely to ignite, leading to a fire or explosion.
The train’s engineer brought the procession to a halt, and the San Bernardino County Fire Department responded to the location shortly after a call came into the dispatch center at 3:44 a.m.
Those who had breached the cargo container carrying the batteries escaped into the night.
Information available publicly was that a single rail car on the northbound track was burning on the tracks near Cajon Boulevard south of Swarthout Canyon Road. Because of the the initial unknown nature of cargo and later determination that the car was carrying batteries, a hazardous material team was dispatched to the scene. Firefighters donned respirators in dealing with the conflagration and a specialist conducted air monitoring. Prior to 11 a.m. June 3, Burlington-Northern, at the direction of firefighters detached the burning rail car and moved it onto a side line off the main track to isolated it and prevent the risk of thermal runaway causing the fire to move beyond the rail car. What was reported as being “eradication” of the fire hazard was effectuated by 2:25 p.m., whereupon the fire trucks that tended to the blaze earlier were released.
-Mark Gutglueck