<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Probably the best video about what happened in Pennsylvania/Ohio and it’s pretty mind blowing. <a href="https://t.co/VbG0kzplRs">pic.twitter.com/VbG0kzplRs</a></p>— Erin Elizabeth Health Nut News 🙌 (@unhealthytruth) <a href="https://twitter.com/unhealthytruth/status/1624938064207290368?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 13, 2023</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
MSM is damn near silent. What a mess, and sounds like bad decisions on the part of officials is making it worse.
I have operated trains thru Salem and East Palestine the news coverage in this article is not entirely accurate, when the Engineer is notified of a defect from a detector the action required is to stop the train with what is called safe train handling. This would typically be reducing the throttle and then apply the train brakes at a normal rate (Service Rate) not an emergency brake application, in fact using an emergency brake application would be considered improper train handling (Unless an emergency was known). The Engineer would be fully aware he was carrying Hazardous Material and applying the brakes in an emergency application would require the conductor to walk the entire train and inspect it and therefore an Engineer initiated emergency application would be avoided at all cost. Now as soon as the train derailed this would cause an automatic emergency brake application this might be where the reporter miss-reported.
At approximately 8:55pm on February 3rd a major train derailment happened near the border between Ohio and Pennsylvania. In an Ohio town called East Palestine, a Norfolk Southern train pulling 150 cars derailed. 20 of those cars were carrying hazardous materials, including a liquified substance called “Vinyl Chloride.”
A massive explosion and fire resulted from the derailment and the nature of the cargo. In an effort to mitigate the problem, responding emergency authorities dug a trench and allowed the chemicals to burn off into the atmosphere. However, vinyl chloride turns into hydrochloric acid when it mixes with water vapor. The resulting chemical toxins can travel with wind, forming toxic clouds.
Several people in the downwind region from the initial explosion have reported health issues. Additionally, animals and fish have been reported to have been killed in the zone where the chemical cloud traveled.
There is now increasing concern about longer term impacts from the release of the chemicals including vinyl chloride.
The White House and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg have been silent on the issue.
Norfolk Southern and the EPA released the full list of chemicals that were being transported, they include:
