RAYMOND Minn. – A mixed freight train derailed, setting cars loaded with flammable ethanol ablaze and forcing the evacuation of everyone within half a mile. No injuries were reported. Exposure to ethanol fumes can render a person unconscious. Other symptoms: Coughing, dizziness, burning eyes, and drowsiness. The derailment was about 1 a.m. near Raymond, a hamlet of 470 people on the Burlington Northern Santa Fe line between Willmar and Granite Falls. Besides ethanol, the 40-car train also was carrying corn syrup, which can sizzle but isn’t explosive. Fourteen cars carried ethanol. Fire crews streamed water on the inferno through the night.  Kandiyohi County deputies halted automobile traffic in and out of Raymond, which is near crossroads of State Highways 7, 13 and 23. The Unity Church eight miles away in Prinsburg became an emergency shelter for displaced people.

2023 03 20 train drail RAYMIND - Winona Journal

Burst tankers ablaze. Ten miles southwest of Willmar.

202 03 30 raymnd mn TRAIN derail - Winona Journal

At dawn. Mangled wreckage, scorched earth.