Animal guts and entrails splattered in RDP after transport truck makes abrupt stop

A witness described it as a scene out of a horror film.

On Tuesday night, the driver of a transport truck hauling pig parts slammed hisbrakes after being cut off.

The hard stop caused animal guts and entrails to spill out from under a loose tarpaulin, sloshing all over the road and splattering objects nearby.

The next morning, some ofthe mess on Henri Bourassa Boulevard in the Montreal borough of Rivire-des-Prairies still hadn't been cleaned up. Pig guts and entrails were hanging from trees andsplatteredon the sidewalk.

"A scene out of a horror film," is the wayresident Joseph Paglia described it.

He was on his way home from his child's hockey practice when he stumbled upon the mess.

"There was intestines, animal remnants, stomach, lungs, hearts splattered all over the street," he said.

"The smell was unbelievable. I had a hard time keeping my dinner in."

On Tuesday evening, a loader came byto scoop up the animal parts and cart the mess away. It took a couple of hours to complete.

Recurring problem

The truck had beenon its way to the Sanimax rendering plant a couple of kilometres away from the accident, taking a route that isn't far fromresidential neighbourhoods.

Residents are imploring Sanimax to be more careful with its shipments, saying sealing off trucks with a simple tarp thrown over the load is not enough.

"We continuouslyhave spills of this nature, and they refuse to do anything about it," said Theo Vecera. "We don't want band-aid solutions. We want real solutions."

A Facebook page, Sanimax SOS by le Mouvement Citoyens du RDP, was created in 2012 to address the "odours, truck traffic and water contamination in relation to operations at Sanimax."

Sanimax's general manager said the company's record is solid.

"We've got to understand that we do over 25,000 transportations in Montreal, and 99.8 per cent of them will happen without any incident," said Eric Caputo.

Sanimax has receivednearly $800,000 in fines for infractions in the past fines that the company is fighting in court.

A statement from the borough says it's adding incidents with Sanimax to a file that's already before the courts.

With files from Elias Abboud