The operations of Canadian Pacific and Canadian National railways could have sparked the devastating June 2021 Lytton fire, according to a B.C. Supreme Court judge .

On Tuesday, Justice Ward Branch approved a class-action lawsuit that claims the deadly blaze was linked to the two rival railways that have parallel lines running through the village 100 kilometres north of Hope. A section of that line is shared by the two railways.

“CN and CP have, by agreement, granted one another the right to operate trains on each other’s tracks. Under this agreement, CN and CP predominantly operate westbound trains down the CN Track. The implicated train in this case was running westbound on the CN Track, heading down toward the South Lytton Bridge,” Branch wrote.

“It is operations on the CN track th

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