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Sgt. Lapointe said the fire is hampering efforts to recover the missing. “We haven’t been on the scene. We don’t know what exactly we’ll be looking at once we get there.”

Mr. Lauzon offered a sobering glimpse of the wasteland that will be found. “It’s what you see when there’s a big forest fire in the United States,” he said. “That’s what we have here — only parts of buildings, trees burned, no grass at all. It’s destruction.”

The runaway train caused a series of explosions, destroying the heart of Lac-Megantic and sending spectacular fireballs dozens of metres into the sky. Up to 60 more people are believed to be missing, but authorities are refusing to give any numbers beyond the one confirmed fatality.

“The train went by at 75 miles an hour, it was going like a crazy train,” said resident Gilles Fluet, who had just called it a night and left the popular Musi-Café shortly after 1 a.m. Saturday with his two friends when he saw the freight train barrelling down the tracks that cut through town.

“The wheels were smoking, because the brakes were overheating. I said to my friends, ‘Run, because that’s not going to make the turn. It’s going to crash.’ We could see they were all tankers carrying oil.”

They ran up the street and turned the corner just before the first explosion. “It was a hot wind, a bit like a torch had hit us,” Mr. Fluet, 65, said. “The wife of the guy with me was burned on her arm and leg. She was knocked down by the explosion.”

They managed to gather themselves and run to safety.