If you needed a reminder that wildfire season doesn’t care how big your machine is, this one will do it. A video making the rounds online shows a Canadian National Railway crew parked inside their train cab near Armstrong, Ontario, on July 13, with flames visible through every window of the car. The footage was shot by a crew member on his cellphone, and by his own account, following company policy on video recording was not exactly top of mind while the fire closed in.
The train had stopped at a meeting point to let another train pass, which is a routine part of single-track operations in that part of the country. What was not routine was the wall of orange that showed up outside the glass a few minutes later. CN has since confirmed the video is authentic and says every worker in that cab made it out safely, along with the rest of the crew in the area.
Armstrong sits well north of Thunder Bay, out in the kind of remote wooded stretch where a fire can move fast and give very little warning. CN responded by temporarily suspending rail operations through the area and evacuating both its employees and the residents of the town itself. That is a serious call for a freight railway to make, and it tells you how quickly things escalated on the ground that night.
There’s also a political angle worth knowing about, reported CBC. A local Ontario legislator has publicly backed the crew, saying the worker recording the video was focused on survival rather than the company’s no-filming rule, and that he wasn’t sure he would make it out. He’s pushing for CN to support the workers involved rather than discipline them over the footage, and for those affected to get help through the province’s workplace safety board.
A Rough Season for Rail in Fire Country
Northern Ontario has had a brutal stretch of wildfires this summer, with roughly half a dozen communities under mandatory evacuation orders in the northwest region alone. Heat warnings pushing the humidex toward 40 degrees Celsius haven’t helped crews trying to get ahead of the flames.
VIA Rail’s transcontinental Canadian service has also been paused through the same corridor as a result.
Why a Meeting Point Turned Into a Close Call
Armstrong is a division point on CN’s Allanwater Subdivision, part of the main freight line connecting Toronto and Winnipeg. Trains stop there regularly to let opposing traffic clear the single track, which is standard operating procedure on most of Canada’s rail network.
It’s just unlucky timing that this particular stop happened right as fire conditions turned.
What Happens Next
CN says it remains in contact with Ontario’s Ministry of Natural Resources and local authorities as conditions evolve, and that operations will resume once it’s safe to do so.
For now, the video stands as one more reminder of how unpredictable this fire season has been for anyone working the rails through the north.