Sharon DeWitt, emergency measures coordinator for the nearby community of Plaster Rock, said it's unclear how big the fire is or whether anyone was hurt in the accident late yesterday.
"To the best of our knowledge, only a few cars are involved and we are not exactly sure what those cars are carrying," she said in an interview. "We have evacuated homes in the immediate area."
A spokeswoman for Ambulance New Brunswick said no casualties were transported from the site.
"Some of those cars are in the area of the derailment," he said. "Whether they have derailed or are on fire, I do not have confirmation of that."
Feeny said the regularly scheduled freight train was headed to Moncton from Central Canada when it ran into trouble around 7 pm local time. About 150 kilometres (93 miles) northwest of Fredericton in northwest New Brunswick.
The train's engineer and conductor, the only people on the train, were not hurt in the derailment, he said.
There were unconfirmed reports of an explosion, but DeWitt said she was not aware on any blast at the site.
In July, 47 people were killed in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, when a train carrying crude oil derailed.
Another oil train from North Dakota derailed and exploded in Alabama in November, causing no deaths but releasing an estimated 749,000 gallons of oil from 26 tanker cars.
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