PORTLAND, Maine (AP) _ A $460 million (Canadian) settlement fund for victims of an oil train disaster in Canada is fully funded, keeping the process on track for the first payments to victims early in the new year.
Robert Keach, the court-appointed bankruptcy trustee in Portland, announced this week that the settlement is being wired to a wrongful death trustee and to the Canadian monitor, Richter Group.
About $114 million will be used to settle wrongful death claims, and Keach says the wrongful death trustee will begin distributing those checks ``as soon as possible.'' Distribution of the remainder to other victims will proceed as well.
The disaster was caused when a runaway train with 72 oil tankers derailed in July 2013, in Lac Megantic, Quebec, killing 47 people and causing raging fires.