ICBC files Notice of Civil Claim for costs incurred from Trail sulfuric acid spills

October 10, 2018

ICBC has filed a Notice of Civil Claim (NOCC), on behalf of our customers, seeking financial relief for the loss of, or damage to, vehicles caused by the sulfuric acid spills in Trail earlier this year, as well as related costs and expenses.

In the NOCC, ICBC has listed the following entities as negligent parties:

• Westcan, IRM and Teck, collectively known as Corporate Defendants;

• Christopher Hutchinson and John Doe #1 (unknown name), the two commercial truck drivers who operated the Westcan vehicles during the spills;

• Regional District of Kootenay Boundary and the City of Trail, collectively known as Municipal Defendants; and

• Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure and Ministry of Environment, collectively known as Crown Defendants.

ICBC was required to file the NOCC now to ensure that there was no argument available to any of the defendants that it was out of time for bringing this action.

ICBC always has the right to consider recovering losses paid to our customers from any potential negligent party, and this is a standard step to take whenever there are costs to recover.

It is also important that ICBC takes this step, in part, to mitigate any impact these events may have on insurance rates. The current financial pressures on both ICBC's insurance rates and the corporation overall have been well documented.

To date, the losses claimed include hundreds of vehicles that ICBC has determined to be total losses as a result of exposure to sulfuric acid from the April 10 and May 23 spills.

As this is now before the courts, ICBC has no further comment to make at this time.