Tag: Ohio

Ohio officers won’t be charged in shooting of Jayland Walker

[ad_1]
But the officers, not knowing Walker left his gun in the car, believed he was going to fire again at them, Yost said. Yost said it is critical to remember that Walker had fired at police, and that he “shot first.”
Walker’s death last June sparked protests in Akron after police released body camera footage showing him dying in a hail of gunfire. Activists, including from the family of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., spoke about his death. The NAACP and an attorney for Walker’s family called on the Justice Department to open a federal civil rights investigation.
President Joe Biden responded to the shooting during a trip to Ohio last summer by saying the DOJ was monitoring the case.
The state investigation found that police first saw Walker driving with a broken taillight and a broken light on his rear license plate, but they decided not to follow him. They saw him 10 minutes later at the same intersection and decided to pursue him for the equipment violation, Yost said.
Police said Walker refused to stop and then fired a shot from his car 40 seconds into the pursuit.
Officers chased the car on a freeway and city streets until Walker bailed from the still-moving vehicle and ran into a parking lot where he was killed while wearing a ski mask, body cam video showed. Authorities said he represented a “deadly threat.” A handgun, a loaded magazine and a wedding ring were found on the driver’s seat of his car.
Dash-cam video from a police cruiser captured images of Walker firing the gun from his car, said Anthony Pierson, an assistant state attorney general. Walker had no criminal history and had never fired a gun until he went to a shooting range with a friend in early June, Pierson said.

People embrace outside the Akron Civic Center after attending a viewing for Jayland Walker, in Akron, Ohio, on July 13, 2022.
|
Gene J. Puskar/AP Photo
Walker’s family called it a brutal and senseless shooting of a man who was unarmed at the time and whose fiancee recently died. Police union officials said the officers thought there was an immediate threat of serious harm and that their actions were in line with their training and protocols.

Walker had been grieving his fiancée’s recent death but his family had no indication of concern beyond that, a family representative previously said.
Pierson wouldn’t speculate about Walker’s state of mind that night and said there was no direct evidence that he was suicidal.
“That night he encountered the police he wasn’t acting himself,” Pierson said. “By all accounts he was a good person, a good man.”
Blurry body camera footage released last summer did not clearly show what authorities say was a threatening gesture Walker made before he was shot.
The eight officers, whose names have been withheld from the public, initially were placed on leave, but they returned to administrative duties 3 1/2 months after the shooting.
Yost would not release the names of the officers, saying it was his office’s policy not to release the names of people who were not charged.
Attorneys for the eight officers released a statement calling the incident a tragedy for the entire community, including Walker’s family and all of the officers who were involved. “A split-second decision to use lethal force is one that every police officer hopes he or she will never be forced to make,” the statement said.
A county medical officer said the autopsy found no illegal drugs or alcohol were detected in Walker’s body.
After taking over the investigation last summer at the request of Akron police, prosecutors with the Ohio attorney general’s office presented the case to the grand jury.
City leaders have been meeting with community leaders, church groups, activists and business owners ahead of the grand jury meeting while also preparing for potential protests.
The city created a designated protest zone downtown outside the city hall building, where workers put plywood over the first-floor windows. There’s also temporary fencing around the county courthouse and many businesses boarded up their windows.
The city’s school district canceled classes on Tuesday in the wake of the grand jury announcement.
Less than 24 hours before the chase, police in neighboring New Franklin Township had tried to stop a car matching Walker’s, also for unspecified minor equipment violations. A supervisor there called off the pursuit when the car crossed the township’s border with Akron.
[ad_2]
#Ohio #officers #wont #charged #shooting #Jayland #Walker
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

April 18, 2023
Partisan split on rail safety shows at first hearing on Ohio derailment

[ad_1]

Republicans, meanwhile, decried what they suggested was a lack of transparent communication from the EPA, which has met skepticism for its assurances that the community’s air and water are safe.
“A month after the accident, it’s clear to me that EPA’s risk communication strategy fell short,” said top committee Republican Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.). “The initial delays in messaging and response has meant that the residents still do not trust these results enough to feel safe.”
Republicans highlighted that first responders arriving on the scene didn’t immediately know what chemicals they were dealing with. In addition, residents still don’t believe EPA assurances that the air and water are safe because it still doesn’t smell right, Capito said. And, Republicans suggested that the EPA hasn’t provided direct answers on where the soil removed from the site is being shipped.
Capito grilled Debra Shore, EPA’s regional administrator, about how it is handling waste removal at the accident site, echoing complaints from Ohio Republican Sen. J.D. Vance that large amounts of contaminated soil remain. When the soil is disturbed, “it brings the odor and then here comes a lack of trust right back down onto the community,” Capito said.
Shore reported that tests of the contaminated soil revealed only low levels of dioxins, which will allow the waste to be transported to facilities qualified for disposal as soon as Thursday.
Democrats also sought to pin down Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw about whether his company will support a bipartisan rail bill that Vance is offering with senators including Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown
and Pennsylvania Democrat Bob Casey.
“It’s bipartisan — that never happens around here on the big bills,” said Casey. “It’d be a good start by Norfolk Southern to tell us today — in addition to what they’re going to do for the people of Ohio and Pennsylvania — tell us today that they support the bill. That would help, if a major rail company said: ‘We support these reforms, and we’ll help you pass this bill.’”
Shaw did not directly answer the question. But later in the hearing, Shaw praised provisions included in the bill that intend to tighten tank car standards and increase training for first responders. He also mentioned his desire to improve the devices on tracks that detect overheating wheels, which investigators are eyeing as a factor in the derailment.

Other Democrats, including Brown and Vermont Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, criticized Norfolk Southern for what they characterized as focusing more on profits than rail and chemical safety.
“Norfolk Southern chose to invest much of its massive profits in making its executives and shareholders wealthy at the expense of Ohio communities along its rail tracks,” Brown said. He noted that in the last decade, Norfolk Southern eliminated 38 percent of its workforce.
Sanders tried to get Shaw to commit to providing paid sick leave for its workers — one of the changes the Biden administration is seeking. Shaw demurred.
At various points senators also sought to pin Shaw down on specific actions the railroad would take to make residents whole, including compensating people for long term medical costs and economic damages. Shaw responded to that and other attempts to pin him down on specifics with: “We’re committed to doing what’s right for the folks in East Palestine.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders answered: “What’s right is to cover their health care needs. Will you do that?”
Shaw only replied that “everything is on the table.”
“All of us are committed to doing what’s right,” Sanders shot back. “But the devil is in the details.”
Opening the hearing, Shaw apologized for the derailment and pledged “to improve safety immediately.”
“I want to begin today by expressing how deeply sorry I am for the impact this has had on the residents of East Palestine and the surrounding communities,” Shaw said. “I am determined to make this right.”
He said that while federal investigators have preliminarily found that the three-person crew behind the controls “was operating the train below the speed limit and in an approved manner,” it is still “clear the safety mechanisms in place were not enough.”
Norfolk Southern has announced safety changes in the wake of the accident that are tailored to addressing the likely cause — an overheating wheel on a car carrying plastic pellets, which then caught fire. The railroad industry as a whole has also made new safety promises, though they are also tailored to the specific likely cause of the accident.
Still, Shaw acknowledged that those voluntary initiatives “are just the start.”
“The events of the last month are not who we are as a company,” Shaw said, referring not just to the East Palestine derailment but at least two other incidents since then, including one this week that resulted in the death of a conductor.
Alex Guillén contributed to this report.
[ad_2]
#Partisan #split #rail #safety #shows #hearing #Ohio #derailment
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

March 9, 2023
Oversight Republicans are launching an investigation into the Department of Transportation’s handling of a toxic train derailment in Ohio.

[ad_1]

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has come under criticism for his response.

[ad_2]
#Oversight #Republicans #launching #investigation #Department #Transportations #handling #toxic #train #derailment #Ohio
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 24, 2023
Buttigieg, standing near Ohio derailment site, says he could have spoken ‘sooner’

[ad_1]

Buttigieg has faced a barrage of criticism, mostly from conservatives, for what they perceive as a slow response to the derailment, which resulted in toxic chemicals being released into the air and ground. Several Republicans say Buttigieg should have traveled to the crash site sooner, and some have even called for him to be fired or resign.
Former President Donald Trump joined in the barrage on Tuesday, calling out Buttigieg, President Joe Biden and the EPA after touring the site of the crash, a visit intended to jump-start his slow-moving 2024 presidential campaign.
“Buttigieg should’ve been here already,” Trump told reporters as he handed out MAGA hats after speaking alongside Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) and Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio). Trump also said Biden should “get over here.”
On Thursday, after meeting with the mayor, community members, DOT officials and first responders, including the fire chief in this deep-red village nestled in Columbiana County, Buttigieg indirectly addressed those comments in a wide-ranging 30-minute press conference. “And to any national political figure who has decided to get involved in the plight of East Palestine … I have a simple message, which is, I need your help,” Buttigieg said. “Because if you’re serious about this, there is more that we could do to prevent more communities from going through this.”
Asked by POLITICO whether his perceived political ambitions had shaped reaction to his handling of the derailment, Buttigieg said, “I’m here for the work and not for the politics.”
But politics have been driving the narrative for over a week, with no signs of stopping. On Thursday, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, the top Republican on the Senate committee in charge of rail safety, said Buttigieg is “desperate to salvage his credibility” and used a preliminary factual report issued earlier that morning by federal investigators to suggest that his policy solutions are “shallow” and designed to heap blame on Trump.
The pressure has tested the normally mild-mannered former Indiana mayor, who got into a Twitter spat with Florida Sen. Marco Rubio Tuesday after the Republican called for him to resign or be fired. Buttigieg took more veiled shots on Thursday, saying “anyone in Congress who cares about these issues, they are welcome to come to the table and work with us to get things done. So anybody who is interested in that, I’m going to hold them to that.”
When asked Thursday by reporters whether he planned to resign, Buttigieg replied: “I’m not here for politics, I’m here to make sure the community can get what they need.”

The trip coincided with the release of the a preliminary report from National Transportation Safety Board, an independent agency, which found that the crew of the 150-car Norfolk Southern train received an alert about an axle overheating, and attempted to slow the train down before it derailed. The NTSB’s investigation will likely take 12 to 18 months before it determines what caused the derailment.
Despite the criticism, the White House has defended its response and the job Buttigieg has done, noting that officials from the EPA and the NTSB were on the ground within hours of the derailment. On Tuesday, EPA Administrator Michael Regan ordered Norfolk Southern to pay for the cleanup from the crash.
“The Norfolk Southern train derailment has upended the lives of East Palestine families, and EPA’s order will ensure the company is held accountable for jeopardizing the health and safety of this community,” Regan said in a statement Tuesday. “Let me be clear: Norfolk Southern will pay for cleaning up the mess they created and for the trauma they’ve inflicted on this community.”
On Thursday, Buttigieg promised the federal government would make sure that happened.
“We’re gonna be here, day in, day out, year in, year out, making our railroads safer and making sure Norfolk Southern meets its responsibilities. That is a promise, and one I take very, very seriously,” Buttigieg said.
In the meantime, politicians — and the country — should be “wrapping their arms around the people of East Palestine,” Buttigieg said, “not as a political football, not as an ideological flashpoint, not as a ‘gotcha moment,’ but as thousands of human beings whose lives got upended … through no fault of their own.”

[ad_2]
#Buttigieg #standing #Ohio #derailment #site #spoken #sooner
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 24, 2023
Overheating wheel detected too late to stop Ohio train before it derailed

[ad_1]

By then, the engineer was already trying to slow the train. Upon hearing the alarm, the engineer increased the application of the brakes, and then automatic emergency brakes initiated, bringing the train to a stop.
When it stopped, the crew “observed fire and smoke and notified the Cleveland East dispatcher of a possible derailment,” the report said.
Thirty-eight cars derailed and 12 more were damaged in the ensuing fire.
NTSB is continuing to investigate the wheelset and bearing, the design of the tank cars themselves, the accident response, including the venting and burning of the vinyl chloride, railcar design and maintenance procedures and practices, Norfolk Southern’s use of wayside defect detectors, and Norfolk Southern’s railcar inspection practices.
NTSB will brief reporters Thursday afternoon about the report.
[ad_2]
#Overheating #wheel #detected #late #stop #Ohio #train #derailed
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 23, 2023
Overheating wheel detected too late to stop Ohio train before it derailed

[ad_1]

By then, the engineer was already trying to slow the train. Upon hearing the alarm, the engineer increased the application of the brakes, and then automatic emergency brakes initiated, bringing the train to a stop.
When it stopped, the crew “observed fire and smoke and notified the Cleveland East dispatcher of a possible derailment,” the report said.
Thirty-eight cars derailed and 12 more were damaged in the ensuing fire.
NTSB is continuing to investigate the wheelset and bearing, the design of the tank cars themselves, the accident response, including the venting and burning of the vinyl chloride, railcar design and maintenance procedures and practices, Norfolk Southern’s use of wayside defect detectors, and Norfolk Southern’s railcar inspection practices.
NTSB will brief reporters Thursday afternoon about the report.
[ad_2]
#Overheating #wheel #detected #late #stop #Ohio #train #derailed
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 23, 2023
Buttigieg to visit scene of Ohio crash Thursday

[ad_1]

While in the eastern Ohio community of about 5,000 people, Buttigieg will receive an update from the National Transportation Safety Board — the lead agency investigating the crash — on its probe, which could take as long as 18 months to complete. He is also expected to meet with DOT officials who arrived on the ground within hours of the derailment.
Buttigieg’s visit comes as Republicans such as Florida Sens. Rick Scott and Marco Rubio have sharply criticized his handling of the issue, including his slowness to visit the scene of the derailment.
It is exceedingly rare for a transportation secretary to visit the site of a train derailment, especially one that resulted in no fatalities — even though this crash has resulted in unusually heavy national media attention, partly driven by the televised image of the accident’s toxic black plume and residents’ anger over the safety of their air and water. About 1,000 train derailments occur each year, according to federal data.
“The secretary is going now that the EPA has said it is moving out of the emergency response phase and transitioning to the long-term remediation phase,” the person familiar with Buttigieg’s thinking told POLITICO.
The trip comes the day after former President Donald Trump was expected to meet with locals Wednesday and deliver cleaning supplies and pallets of bottled water.
“The Department of Transportation will continue to do its part by helping get to the bottom of what caused the derailment and implementing rail safety measures, and we hope this sudden bipartisan support for rail safety will result in meaningful changes in Congress,” DOT said in a statement Wednesday.
[ad_2]
#Buttigieg #visit #scene #Ohio #crash #Thursday
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 22, 2023
Trump’s visit to Ohio derailment gives Biden’s team some breathing room

[ad_1]

Other Trump critics were more blunt in dismissing the motives behind his visit.
“It’s clear that it’s a political stunt,” said former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a Republican and former member of Congress who led DOT during President Barack Obama’s first term. “If he wants to visit, he’s a citizen. But clearly his regulations and the elimination of them, and no emphasis on safety, is going to be pointed out.”
Buttigieg took his own veiled shot at Trump — though not by name — when answering a POLITICO reporter’s question about the tension between Trump’s rail safety record and his criticisms of the Biden administration.
“There is a chance for everybody who has a public voice on this issue to demonstrate whether they are interested in helping the people of East Palestine or using the people of East Palestine,” Buttigieg said. “A lot of the folks who seem to find political opportunity there are among those who have sided with the rail industry again and again and again as they have fought safety regulations on railroads and [hazardous materials] tooth and nail.”
Buttigieg said he was trying to be careful not to violate the Hatch Act, which restricts federal employees’ political speech, by speaking about a presidential candidate from his position as Cabinet secretary.
Ahead of Wednesday’s appearance, the Democratic National Committee sent reporters a list of Trump’s deregulation efforts, with the subject line: “REMINDER: Trump Slashed Transportation Safety and Environmental Rules, Funding.”
A spokesperson for Trump defended his record and said that he was not to blame for the tragedy in East Palestine.
Trump, who launched his latest presidential bid in November, said on his social media network Truth Social that he was venturing to Ohio to visit “great people who need help, NOW!”

On Wednesday Trump appeared in East Palestine, bringing with him Trump-branded water and cleaning supplies. Speaking in front of an East Palestine Fire Department truck, Trump took shots at the Biden administration’s response, including the EPA, Buttigieg and even Biden himself.
While handing out red MAGA hats, Trump told reporters, “Buttigieg should’ve been here already.” He also had a message for Biden: “Get over here.”
Buttigieg plans to travel to East Palestine Thursday, after taking intense heat from Republicans for not going sooner. The Biden administration has said that high-ranking officials, aside from EPA chief Michael Regan, did not visit East Palestine in the derailment’s immediate aftermath to comply with the evacuation order in place and to avoid impeding investigation and emergency response efforts.
Trump also called on Norfolk Southern to “fulfill its responsibilities and obligations” to the village. The EPA formally put the rail company on the hook Tuesday for covering all costs of the clean up, which the railroad had already pledged to do.
“If our ‘leaders’ are too afraid to actually lead real leaders will step up and fill the void,” his son Donald Trump Jr. wrote on Twitter last week.
Among other criticisms, lawmakers of both parties have questioned DOT’s oversight of the railroad industry’s labor and safety practices in light of the fiery Ohio crash, which unleashed plumes of toxic smoke and left lingering worries about air and water contamination. They have also faulted the Biden administration for not sending any senior leaders to the derailment site until EPA Administrator Michael Regan traveled there last week.
Buttigieg has not yet gone there but said he plans to, and the heads of DOT’s Federal Railroad Administration and its hazardous materials agency are expected to be in East Palestine on Wednesday. Biden administration officials have said that top leaders held off from visiting the site to comply with evacuation orders and to avoid creating a distraction. Still, lower-level investigators and employees from agencies such as the FRA and EPA swarmed to East Palestine within hours after the 150-car Norfolk Southern train went off the track with a cargo that included flammable chemicals such as vinyl chloride.
Because the disaster was a chemical spill, White House officials said, Regan was the lead agency official tasked with responding. Regan’s agency has faced skepticism from residents about its assurances that East Palestine’s air is safe to breathe, despite a lingering odor that has left residents in the village complaining about rashes and headaches.
Buttigieg told reporters Monday that he plans to go to the site “when the time is right.”
“I am very interested in getting to know the residents of East Palestine and hearing from them about how they’ve been impacted and communicating with them about the steps that we were taking,” he said.
Even some less partisan observers have questioned why the Biden administration didn’t send a high-profile official sooner to show its support for people in East Palestine.
“There’s a tremendous value when a catastrophe occurs of a high-ranking official taking charge,” William Reilly, who led EPA during the George H.W. Bush administration, told POLITICO’s E&E News for a story Tuesday. He said the purpose of those visits can include “communicating to the locally impacted people and to the country. The communication part is enormously important. And that did not happen here.”
Local and state political leaders said they welcome high-level attention — to a point. They include East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway, a registered Republican who on Monday had called President Joe Biden’s decision to visit Ukraine before coming to his Ohio village “the biggest slap in the face.”
At a news conference Tuesday, Conaway said Trump is welcome to visit but that he does not want the village to become “political pawns.”
“We don’t want to be a soundbite or a news bite,” Conaway said. “We just want to go back to living our lives the way they were.”
A spokesperson for Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, Daniel Tierney, declined to comment when asked whether Trump is welcome in East Palestine.
One senior administration official, granted anonymity to speak freely because he was not authorized to talk to the media, said Biden’s appointees are “supporting people in East Palestine” while Trump and other Republicans “see the people there as political props.”
“Trump’s visit validates that this is all about politics for him and Republicans who have been quick to criticize and bizarrely blame Secretary Pete yet are the same people who have done Norfolk Southern’s bidding on rolling back major safety requirements,” said the official. “Trump more than anyone.”
Watering down rail regs
As president, Trump made rescinding regulations a major priority for his agencies, even signing an order requiring them to revoke two rules for every one they enact. At the same time, he said he wanted to “ensure that America has among the very cleanest air and cleanest water on the planet.”
His administration’s most high-profile action on rail safety was its withdrawal of a 2015 rule mandating more advanced brakes on some trains carrying especially hazardous materials.
That withdrawal, however, stemmed from intervention by Congress, which required regulators to put the rule through a more stringent cost-benefit analysis after the Obama administration had issued the regulation. The rule ultimately failed that analysis.
Even if that rule had taken effect, it would not have applied to the train that derailed in East Palestine, the chair of the National Transportation Safety Board — the lead agency investigating the crash — wrote on Twitter last week. Still, environmental groups pressed Buttigieg last week to restore the Obama-era brake rule, writing that “[i]t should not take a tragedy like the recent hazardous train derailment in Ohio … to turn attention to this issue again.”
Trump’s DOT also took several rulemaking actions sought by railroad companies that could weaken safety, including its withdrawal of a rule requiring that a crew of at least two people be present on freight trains. The Obama administration had proposed that rule in response to a fiery oil-train derailment that killed 47 people in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, in 2013.
The Trump administration argued that “a train crew staffing rule would unnecessarily impede the future of rail innovation and automation.”
Railroad companies say no factual justification exists for mandating crews of more than one person. Such a requirement, they argue, would make U.S. railroads less competitive and could even undermine climate efforts if it makes shippers turn to trucking, which emits more pollution than trains do.
The Norfolk Southern train that derailed in Ohio had three crew members aboard. After the derailment, Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) asked in a letter to Buttigieg whether that was too few people to control such a long train.
The Trump administration also dropped a ban on shipping liquefied natural gas by rail tank car, saying the expansion of U.S. natural gas production necessitated the rollback. The ban had been a response to concerns about possible explosions.
In addition, Trump’s Federal Railroad Administration stopped conducting regular rail safety audits of railroads — which the Biden administration later reinstituted — and allowed railroads to replace some human safety inspections with automation.
Under Trump, “railroads could apply for relief from federal regulations, and FRA would grant them,” said Gregory Hynes, the national legislative director of the country’s largest rail union, SMART Transportation Division.
“It’s really shocking what they’ve been able to get away with,” he said.
On chemicals, a rollback of ‘almost everything’
Advocates of tougher regulations on toxic chemicals expressed just as much frustration.
Under Trump, “there was a rollback of, you know, almost everything,” said Sonya Lunder, the Sierra Club’s senior toxics adviser.
Trump’s EPA repealed regulations intended to prevent chemical accidents at industrial facilities and rolled back requirements for companies to regularly assess whether safer technologies or practices have become available. It also withdrew requirements that companies have third-party audits to determine the root causes of accidents.
The Biden administration last year proposed reinstating all those requirements.
Public health advocates also criticized the Trump administration’s implementation of the Toxic Substances Control Act, a longstanding law that Congress gave a bipartisan overhaul in 2016.
Advocates say the law was designed to require EPA to look at the overall health dangers of chemicals, but the Trump administration took steps to look at risks in only a piecemeal fashion. For instance, it declined to factor in chemicals Americans breathe from the air or drink in their water, limiting analyses to only direct exposure from products or uses. The Biden administration has reversed that policy and reconsidered some chemicals’ risks, with potential restrictions or bans on the way.
A federal court in 2019 faulted the Trump-era EPA for avoiding studying certain health risks of some chemicals like asbestos.
Trump’s political appointees also overruled career scientists on a health assessment for a type of PFAS, or so-called “forever chemicals,” that contaminates almost a million Americans’ drinking water and tried to bury internal reports that warned of unsafe chemicals in the air and water.
In addition, Trump proposed shuttering the Chemical Safety Board, a tiny agency that investigates accidents at industrial facilities but has no regulatory or enforcement power.
These rollbacks were carried out by several political appointees with industry ties. Those included Nancy Beck, a former expert for the trade group American Chemistry Council, who became the top political appointee in EPA’s chemical office and limited the agency’s study of hazardous chemicals. Trump later tried to appoint Beck to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, but her nomination stalled in the Senate.
Kayla Guo contributed to this report.

[ad_2]
#Trumps #visit #Ohio #derailment #Bidens #team #breathing #room
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 22, 2023
‘Trust the government’: EPA seeks to reassure Ohio residents near toxic spill

[ad_1]
The head of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) got a first-hand look on Thursday at the toll left by a freight train derailment in Ohio, where toxic chemicals spilled or were burned off, leaving the stench of fresh paint nearly two weeks later.
The EPA’s administrator, Michael Regan, walked along a creek that still reeks of chemicals and sought to reassure skeptical residents that the water was fit for drinking and the air safe to breathe around East Palestine, where just less than 5,000 people live near the Pennsylvania state line.
“I’m asking they trust the government. I know that’s hard. We know there’s a lack of trust,” Regan said. “We’re testing for everything that was on that train.”
Since the derailment, residents have complained about headaches and irritated eyes and finding their cars and lawns covered in soot. The hazardous chemicals that spilled from the train killed thousands of fish and residents have talked about finding dying or sick pets and wildlife.
Residents are frustrated by what they say is incomplete and vague information about the lasting effects from the disaster, which prompted evacuations.
“I have three grandbabies,” said Kathy Dyke, who came with hundreds of her neighbors to a public meeting on Wednesday where representatives of railroad operator Norfolk Southern were conspicuously absent. “Are they going to grow up here in five years and have cancer?”
Regan said on Thursday that anyone who is fearful of being in their home should seek testing from the government.
“People have been unnerved. They’ve been asked to leave their homes,” he said, adding that if he lived there, he would be willing to move his family back into the area as long as the testing shows it’s safe.

Those attending the previous night’s informational session had questions about health hazards and demanded more transparency from Norfolk Southern, whose representatives did not attend, citing concerns about staff safety. Many who had waited in a long line snaking outside the high school gymnasium came away upset that they didn’t hear anything new. Some booed or laughed each time they heard the village mayor or state health director assure them that lingering odors weren’t dangerous.
Residents of East Palestine gather to discuss the train derailment and toxic chemical burn-off on 15 February. Photograph: Alan Freed/Reuters
“They just danced around the questions a lot,” said Danielle Deal, who lives a few miles from the derailment site. “Norfolk needed to be here.”
At least five lawsuits have been filed against the railroad, which announced this week that it is creating a $1m fund to help the community while continuing to remove spilled contaminants from the ground and streams, and monitoring air quality.
“We are here and will stay here for as long as it takes to ensure your safety and to help East Palestine recover and thrive,” Norfolk Southern president and CEO Alan Shaw said in a letter to the community.
Families who evacuated said they wanted assistance figuring out how to get the promised financial help. Beyond that, they wanted to know whether the railroad would be held responsible.
State and federal officials have promised to make sure Norfolk Southern not only pays for the cleanup but also reimburses residents.
The White House said that federal health and emergency response teams and officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will go to East Palestine.
“We understand the residents are concerned – as they should be – and they have questions. That’s all understandable,” said White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. “And we’re going to get to the bottom of this.”
No one was injured when about 50 cars derailed in a fiery, mangled mess on the outskirts of East Palestine on 3 February. Officials seeking to avoid an uncontrolled blast evacuated the area and opted to release and burn toxic vinyl chloride from five rail cars, sending flames and black smoke billowing into the sky again.
The Ohio EPA said the latest tests show that five wells supplying the village’s drinking water are free from contaminants.
At least 3,500 fish, mostly small ones such as minnows and darters, have been found dead along more than seven miles (11.2km) of streams, according to the estimates from the Ohio department of natural resources.
Precautions are being taken to ensure that contaminants that reached the Ohio River don’t make it into drinking water, officials said.
There have been anecdotal reports that pets or livestock have been sickened. No related animal deaths have been confirmed and the risk to livestock is low, Ohio officials said, but the state’s agriculture department is testing samples from a beef calf that died a week after the derailment.
The suspected cause of the derailment is a mechanical issue with a rail car axle. The National Transportation Safety Board said it has video appearing to show a wheel bearing overheating just before the derailment. The NTSB expects to issue its preliminary report in about two weeks.
[ad_2]
#Trust #government #EPA #seeks #reassure #Ohio #residents #toxic #spill
( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )

February 17, 2023
EPA chief promises results after Ohio train crash

[ad_1]

His visit came as the Biden administration is facing pressure from state leaders and federal lawmakers of both parties to require Norfolk Southern to clean up its toxic pollution.
Regan said EPA was conducting indoor testing and had so far cleared 480 homes as free of vinyl chloride and hydrogen chloride, two of the most dangerous of the chemicals that were transported by the train. He also noted EPA has been conducting round-the-clock air monitoring from ground sources and via the agency’s sniffer plane.
State and local agencies are also conducting tests of public drinking water supplies. Ohio EPA Director Anne Vogel said tests of municipal wells showed no signs of contaminants, though owners of private wells should have them tested before drinking from them. Bottled water is available in the interim.
Regan said at the news conference that Norfolk Southern will pay for the response.
“We are absolutely going to hold Norfolk Southern accountable and I can promise you that,” he said.
Norfolk Southern President and CEO Alan Shaw wrote in an open letter to the town on Thursday that the railroad “will stay here for as long as it takes to ensure your safety and to help East Palestine recover and thrive.” However, he angered residents by declining to attend a Wednesday night town hall on the disaster.
EPA formally informed Norfolk Southern last week that it is potentially liable to pay for all clean-up costs related to the derailment. The company has said it “is willing to perform or finance the response activities related to the incident.”
Regan’s visit prompted bipartisan comity among lawmakers who represent the area.

“Administrator Regan, I want to thank you for coming in today. It means a lot to these folks here,” said Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio).
However, the incident has also stirred up bipartisan complaints, both about the Biden administration’s immediate response and longer-term issues with regulatory oversight over the shipment of hazardous materials.
“While I am glad EPA Administrator Regan will visit the site today, it is unacceptable that it took nearly two weeks for a senior administration official to show up,” Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said in a statement. He called on the administration “to provide a complete picture of the damage and a comprehensive plan to ensure the community is supported in the weeks, months and years to come, and this sort of accident never happens again.”
Sens. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) in a Wednesday letter to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg questioned federal oversight of the railroad industry. “It is not unreasonable to ask whether a crew of two rail workers, plus one trainee, is able to effectively monitor 150 cars,” they wrote.
Rubio has gone even further in his criticisms of Buttigieg.
“I don’t know what @SecretaryPete needs to do to get fired,” he tweeted on Thursday.
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said on Thursday that he’s investigating whether trains carrying hazardous materials are required to be labeled, which could help responders better understand and react to tankers’ contents.
“But we think we might need a change in federal law and Bill [Johnson] and I will work on that,” Brown said.
Tension in the village has been building since the train crashed, especially after officials decided to burn off the remaining vinyl chloride at the site to prevent an explosion.
Hundreds of residents attended Wednesday’s town hall, but Norfolk Southern representatives declined to attend because of alleged threats against its employees.
“We have become increasingly concerned about the growing physical threat to our employees and members of the community around this event stemming from the increasing likelihood of the participation of outside parties,” the company said in a statement ahead of the meeting.
Vinyl chloride is a clear gas used to make polyvinyl chloride, a common form of plastic. Acute exposure can lead to nervous system effects like dizziness and headaches. Chronic exposure can lead to liver problems, including a rare form of cancer called angiosarcoma.
The train was carrying a variety of substances in addition to five tankers of vinyl chloride, according to a manifest dated Feb. 12 released by EPA. Other derailed cars included hazardous materials such as butyl acrylate, ethylene glycol and monobutyl ether. Also on the train in cars that do not appear to have derailed were solid plastics products such as polyethylene and polypropylene, several tankers full of petroleum lube oil, and nine box cars full of malt liquors.

[ad_2]
#EPA #chief #promises #results #Ohio #train #crash
( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 17, 2023