"Thankfully there appears to be no leaking, but this is exactly the type of accident that should alarm us all about oil trains coming through our city," Seattle City Council Member Mike O'Brien tells me by phone from the scene. He spearheaded a council letter sent this week to federal regulators demanding an immediate ban on DOT-111 tanker cars.

As KOMO reports:

The train was traveling under the Magnolia Bridge at about 5 mph at the time. Two of the tankers are leaning, and one at a 45-degree pitch will be pumped out. It holds 27,000 gallons of oil. No one was injured.

"Just imagine the impacts if this train were to leak with Puget Sound so close," O'Brien says. "Or worse if it exploded a stones throw from thousands of commuters headed to work. Cities like Seattle bear the risk while oil companies profit, and the environment loses either way."