Lifestyle

Train Dumps Whipped Cream Into Water, Killing Hundreds of Fish

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Tony Maples Photography

 

On Friday, strong winds caused 53 train cars to derail carrying containers from Memphis to Los Angeles. One of the refrigerated cars contained whipped cream. Needless to say, the result of the derailment was an absolute mess. Though it’s a crying shame to lose that much delicious whipped topping, the worst part is the damage and that it resulted in a fish kill.

KVMC/KAUM Radio posted about the incident on their Facebook page, saying that “when the train derailed, it [the whipped cream] was leaked into the creek near Loraine that empties out into Lake Champion and killed the catfish.” They also posted pictures of the murky water, which they report was later pumped out.

How exactly did the whipped cream hurt hundreds of fish? KTXS explains that the “bacteria eating the sugars in the whipped cream caused oxygen levels to drop.” Thankfully, it will not hurt the Champion Creek Reservoir.  A Facebook commenter adds, “Although this is very sad. The most important thing is thankfully no one got killed. My brother is an engineer & this hit close to home!”

The Union Pacific Railroad says that it will take an additional week to clean up all of the derailed cars, but only two days after the incident, the line was already back open.