Norfolk Southern backed out of a community meeting due to threats, as anxiety lingered in East Palestine

Environmental Protection Agency of the East Palestine, Ohio, Emergency Medical Evacuation Area after a Collision Driven by a High-Velocity Diesel Engine

The people of East Palestine, Ohio are encouraged to return to their homes, more than a year after a large train wreck and explosion. There are many questions about how the train derailed, what the long-term effects on the residents could be, and whether there is any residual chemical exposure.

The authorities in East Palestine warned that burning vinyl chloride would cause a lot of problems as well as the toxic gas hydrogen chloride. They said Wednesday subsequent air monitoring hasn’t detected dangerous levels inside or outside the mile-radius evacuation zone, which stretched into Pennsylvania. Drabick said Tuesday that the air and water samples from the area show it is now safe and the order to leave is lifted. The emergency response over the last few days was helped by state and federal officials.

James Justice of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said around-the-clock air monitoring has shown normal, un-concerning levels. The air quality in the town is safe according to the hundreds of data points from that.

No injuries have been reported from the derailment or from the controlled release of the chemicals on Monday, but some people have complained about smelling chlorine and smoke in the air and having headaches.

Some residents were ordered to leave shortly after the accident due to concerns about the health risks of the chemicals.

The commander of the Ohio National Guard previously said that members wearing protective gear would take readings inside homes, basements and businesses as officials aimed to ensure the air was safe before lifting the evacuation order.

Environmental Protection Agency and Norfolk Southern Expenditure Action in the East Palestine Pedestrian Center Decay on Saturday, April 27

About 50 cars, including 10 carrying hazardous materials, derailed in a fiery crash Friday night on the edge of East Palestine. A mechanical problem with the rail car part is believed to have caused the train to derail.

At least one lawsuit has been filed over the derailment. An East Palestine business owner and two other residents sued the rail operator in federal court on Tuesday, alleging negligence by Norfolk Southern and exposure to toxic substances as a result. They are seeking to make this a class-action case for people who were hurt because of the spilled chemicals and residents in the evacuated area.

No vinyl chloride has been detected in any down-gradient waterways near the train derailment, she said Tuesday. But an estimated 3,500 fish across 12 species are estimated to have been killed by the derailment and spillage, said Mary Mertz, director of Ohio’s Department of Natural Resources.

Though an evacuation order was lifted last week, some residents refuse to return amid fears the water, air, soil and surfaces in the village of 5,000 are still not safe.

The EPA, with the Ohio National Guard and a Norfolk Southern contractor have collected air samples for vinyl chloride, hydrogen chloride, carbon dioxide and other compounds in the East Palestine community. The EPA posted air monitoring results Tuesday on its website and included more than a dozen instruments, each with four different types of measures, saying the screening level had not been exceeded.

He said that the Ratner home had been tested and was cleared to live in. In a news update on Monday, the EPA said there were no detections of hazardous chemicals in the air of 291 homes and that schools and a library would also be screened.

Of particular concern is the vinyl chloride, which was loaded on five cars — a carcinogen that becomes a gas at room temperature. It it commonly used to make polyvinyl chloride or PVC, which is a kind of plastic used for pipes, wire and cable coatings and car parts.

When vinyl chloride is exposed in the environment, it breaks down from sunlight within a few days and changes into other chemicals such as formaldehyde. The chemical can be quickly absorbed by the air or soil when spilled, according to Ohio Department of Health.

The EPA has been monitoring for several other hazardous chemicals, including phosgene and hydrogen chloride, which are released by burning vinyl chloride. According to the CDC, exposure to phosgene can cause eye irritation, dry burning throat and vomiting, while hydrogen chloride can irritate the skin, nose, eyes and throat.

Indoor Air Quality in East Palestine: Implications for EPA, Surface Water, and the Decay of a High-Energy Nuclear Collision

The professor at the Ohio State University who studies indoor air quality said people are going to be concerned about the long-term exposure that comes at lower levels.

She added that indoor spaces can be an important point of exposure, which is why she urges East Palestine residents to take part in EPA’s at-home air screening.

Dannemiller advises residents to wash items that absorb odors and clean surfaces, including areas that collect dust. She also advises vacuuming carefully in short bursts to try to prevent contaminants from moving into the air.

“The suspected overheated wheel bearing has been collected and will be examined by engineers from the NTSB Materials Laboratory in Washington, D.C,” the statement said.

The wheelset will undergo a metallurgical examination as part of the overall investigation. Once the decontaminated tank cars are examined, investigators will return to complete their examination.

The NTSB said it is reviewing other videos, too, including footage from two local businesses reported by local media to show glowing or flames from the train prior to the derailment.

Authorities worried about a large, deadly explosion and that’s what caused the wreckage to burn for days. The chemical can kill quickly at high levels, which can increase the risk of cancer. The substance was burned away after spilling into a trench.

“If this is true – and I’m told it’s true – this is absurd,” DeWine said. When we have trains carrying hazardous material that are going through the state of Ohio, we should know.

Almost 500 cubic yards of “vinyl chloride-impacted material” has been removed, according to the Ohio EPA, and cleanup of contaminated dirt near the derailment site continues.

Some waterways indeed have been contaminated – but the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency is confident contaminants are contained, said Tiffany Kavalec, the agency’s division chief of surface water.

The Ohio River has a water body that can absorb pollutants very quickly, and that is the reason that fire combustion chemicals flowed to it. She said the Ohio EPA and other agencies have tracked the pollutants in real time and that they are moving at a mile an hour.

The chemicals are a “contaminant plume” that the Ohio EPA and other agencies have been tracking in real time. Kavalec said that it was moving about a mile an hour.

The “tracking allows for potential closing of drinking water intakes to allow the majority of the chemicals to pass. As an added benefit, this strategy along with drinking water treatment help ensure the safety of the drinking water supplies and they’re pretty confident that the low levels of pollutants that remain are not getting passed onto customers.

Authorities recommend that people in the area use bottled water if their water comes from a private source, such as a well.

The Ohio Railroad spill is an ill-advised disaster: How much air pollution does it take to cause an earthquake? A spokesperson for the Transportation Department in Cleveland, Ohio

More than seven miles of streams have been affected by the spill and more than 3,500 small fish have been killed.

Initial testing and sampling by the state agency led to the estimation of the dead fish. There does not appear to have been an increase in the number of fish killed since the first couple of days following the derailment.

The Ohio EPAs Office of Emergency Response says some of the dirt pits are about 700 feet long and 8 feet deep.

The health director of Ohio said air quality does not seem to be the cause of headaches and sore throats among people or deaths of animals in and around the derailed train area.

necdotes are difficult due to their being anecdotes. “Everything that we’ve gathered thus far is really pointing toward very low measurements, if at all.”

America’s railroads move a lot of chemicals. In the year 2021, 2.2 million cars of chemicals were moved on freight trains.

The mode of transportation that is capable of moving large amounts is known as the Federal Rail Administration. “These commodities cannot be moved by pipeline; the alternative is moving them by truck over the highways, which is not looked upon favorably.”

It was found in a USA Today analysis that other forms of transportation are leak-prone, with two involving planes and 67 on highways.

“The real issue is the risk of derailment and explosion,” Kimberly Garrett, a researcher and PFAS expert at Northeastern University. If natural gas were to go down like the vinyl chloride it would be terrible.

Water Treatment and Air-Soil Tests in the Ohio Rail Car Accidental Spikes Containing a Chemically-Induced Chemical Compound

The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency has been conducting air, soil, and water tests after the controlled explosion of chemicals inside rail cars.

Whelton told CNN the EPA should also continue to monitor semi-volatile organic compounds, which are more persistent and detected in local waterways after the derailment.

“Because of their size, they don’t go in the air as easily,” Whelton said. “They like to stick to soils and other materials. The question is, what can they do to clean up the creek?

Anecdotal reports of pets and chickens dying have not yet been confirmed by officials. Mary Mertz, the director of Ohio’s Department of Natural Resources, said Tuesday that there’s no evidence that non-aquatic species have been affected by the spill.

Kurt Kollar, the ON-SPC for the Ohio EPA’s Office of Emergency Response, stated that crews have excavated and removed nearly 500 cubic yards ofvinylchloride-impacted material. The EPA is blocking off ditches around the contaminated dirt so that it doesn’t cause more water problems.

Kavalec said water treatment facilities should be able to remove some of the low levels of volatile organic compounds in the water, and that the water will eventually be safe to drink.

In addition to the chemicals officials say should break down with aeration and water treatment, environmental officials need to test for a class of chemicals used to put out chemical fires.

The Velez Family’s Home in East Palestine, California, Amenable to the Censorship Impact of the September 11, 2009, Train Derailment

There was an overwhelming smell of chlorine in the air this week when the Velez family had been raising their two children.

In a statement, Norfolk Southern said it was not attending Wednesday’s open house gathering with local, state and federal officials because of a “growing physical threat to our employees and members of the community around this event.”

There is a growing physical threat to our employees and members of the community around this event because of the increasing likelihood of the participation of outside parties.

Company officials had hoped to join local leaders Wednesday evening to update the community on the steps they are taking to “safely clean up the accident site and to provide the latest results from ongoing water and air testing,” the release reads.

A community meeting still was expected to go forward Wednesday evening, and plaintiff’s attorneys invited residents to meet with them beforehand to discuss the derailment’s impact.

Many residents of East Palestine are still nervous after the train wreck. Some, like Velez, are spending small fortunes to try to keep their families safely away from the place they used to call home.

“My wife is a nurse and is not taking any chances exposing us and our two young children to whatever is now in our town,” Velez wrote on Facebook. The risk and anxiety of being in our own home again is not worth it.

The Ohio Rail Rail Line Disaster Movie: Public Works, Public Water, and the Valley’s Most Contaminated Residuals

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the water in five of the village’s wells has been tested and found to be free of contaminants. Private water wells are more likely to be tested by the EPA because they are closer to the surface.

A spokesperson for the company said “some soil is moved around” during the initial response phase. The company is removing soil and other material from the site.

The office of emergency response of the Ohio EPA said on February 8 that after the emergency response is done, the agency will remain involved in the long-term clean up of these types of spills. The federal EPA, too, will “continue to do everything in our power to help protect the community,” Administrator Michael Regan said Tuesday.

Norfolk Southern did not list soil removal in the document that was sent to the EPA.

“Contaminated soil will continue (to) leech contaminants, both up into the air, and down into the surrounding ground,” Richard Peltier, an environmental health scientist at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, told CNN in an email. “Every time it rains, a flood of new contaminants will enter the ecosystem.”

CNN asked Norfolk Southern if it had filled in the areas of contaminated soil that it had not cleaned before reopening the rail line.

Ben Ratner told CNN that he and his family worry about the longer-term risks being assessed by environmental officials.

The directors of the disaster movie are still reeling from the mystery of what happened and are still coming to grips with their feelings, said Ben, who owns a cafe a few towns.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/15/us/ohio-train-derailment-east-palestine-residents/index.html

The impact of low levels of contaminants on the Ratner family’s water use: A headache and an aging fear when traveling to the area

“It’s hard to make an investment in something like that or even feel good about paying our mortgage whenever there might not be any value to those things in the future,” he said. It’s difficult to come to grips with.

A $1 million fund will be created by NorfolkSouthern to support the community of 4,700 people while continuing the work of removing spills from the ground and streams.

But when Velez returned Monday for a short visit to the neighborhood where his family has lived since 2014 to check his home and his business, he developed a nagging headache that, he said, stayed with him through the night – and left him with a nagging fear.

Misinformation and exaggerations spread online, and state and federal officials have repeatedly offered assurances that air monitoring hasn’t detected any remaining concerns. Even low levels of contaminants that aren’t considered hazardous can create lingering odors or symptoms such as headaches, Ohio’s health director said Tuesday.

James Lee, a spokesman for the Ohio EPA, told CNN on Wednesday that people in the area and far away might smell odors from the site. “This is because some of the substances involved have a low odor threshold. This means people may smell these contaminants at levels much lower than what is considered hazardous.”

The Ratner family is limiting its water use because of unknown affects, Ben Ratner said. He writes on Facebook that every time he takes his daughter for a bath it could be hazardous.

An Airbnb-Hopper in a Harmful Environment: Telling Norfolk Southern to Stop Waiting for the Evicted Residents and Make East Palestine Grow Again

He and his family have been Airbnb-hopping 30 minutes from their home since they evacuated, but rental options and their finances are running out, he said, and a friend set up a GoFundMe to help the family.

“Unfortunately, many of us residents are stuck in the same situation and the sad truth is that there is no answer,” he wrote. Leaving and paying a mortgage on a potentially worthless home is the only viable solution.

Hundreds of worried people gathered to hear state officials tell them — as they did earlier in the day — that testing so far has shown local air is safe to breathe and to promise that safety testing of the air and water would continue.

But residents had many questions over health hazards and they demanded more transparency from the railroad operator, Norfolk Southern, which did not attend the gathering, citing safety concerns for its staff.

Wednesday’s meeting came amid continuing concerns about the huge plumes of smoke, persisting odors, questions over potential threats to pets and wild animals, any potential impact on drinking water and what was happening with cleanup.

“Why are they being hush-hush?” Kathy said that there was a railroad. “They’re not out here supporting, they’re not out here answering questions. For three days we had no idea what the train was carrying.

While the railroad offered assistance to families who evacuated, many people in the area want to know if they’ll be held responsible for what happened.

Yost said in a letter to the company that the pollution caused harm to the environment and created a nuisance.

Alan Shaw, president and CEO of Norfolk Southern, stated in a statement that they will be judged by their actions. We are cleaning up the site in a responsible way and helping the community identify what needs to happen in order to make East Palestine thrive again.