Residents of an east Ohio village will learn about the deadly wreck of a Norfolk Southern train last year, which destroyed their lives. A new hearing is set to begin in their hometown on Tuesday. The National Transportation Safety Board will discuss the ongoing investigation and make recommendations for preventing future disasters.
On the outskirts East Palestine, near the Pennsylvania boundary, dozens of freight cars, including 11 hazardous materials, derailed on Feb. 3, 2023. Residents fled as fears of an explosion grew. Officials intentionally released and burnt toxic vinyl chloride, despite its potential health effects.
The NTSB stated early on that a bearing overheating on one of railcars was likely the cause of the crash. Trackside sensors did not detect the problem in time. Investigations have revealed other possible causes, including widespread rail job reductions and rushed inspections. Investigators also looked into why officials deliberately blew open vinyl chloride cars to burn the key ingredient used to make PVC pipes.
The NTSB’s recommendations for safety improvements will be a key topic on Tuesday. Although NTSB recommendations don’t have to be followed, it is possible that Congress will enforce some of them due to the attention brought on rail safety after the crash.
A bipartisan group of legislators led by Ohio’s senators proposed reforms more than a year earlier, including the requirement of two-person crews as well as standards for inspections and detectors to help prevent derailments. The bill was stalled by Republicans and railroads in the Senate. GOP leaders in the House said they would not consider new rail safety rules until the NTSB final report was released.
Federal regulators have also tried to get railroads to change their ways, such as signing up for an anonymous hotline to report safety issues. However, they have had limited success. The industry has responded to the crash with promises to install more trackside detections, review their use and help first responders better handle derailments through more training and better information about the cargo.
Norfolk Southern’s Chief Executive Officer, for his part, pledged to “make the things right” in East Palestine by providing more than $100,000,000 in aid to residents and community. Alan Shaw, the CEO of Norfolk Southern, also hired a nuclear power industry consultant to make recommendations and worked with labor. Yet critics said Norfolk Southern had done the minimum for safety in the past and that workers reported no major changes in day-today operations.
After the derailment all major freight railroads committed to improving safety by adding hundreds of trackside sensors that would help detect problems such as overheating bearings, and by reevaluating how they analyze data from these detectors. The Association of American Railroads, a trade group, said that the industry would review the NTSB’s report and seek out additional ways to improve safety. The industry’s efforts to improve safety have not yet resulted in a significant improvement in the Federal Railroad Administration’s statistics.
Jennifer Homendy, Chair of the NTSB, told Congress earlier this year that the agency’s investigations had determined that the controversial vent and burn operation that prompted evacuations as well as sent a plume black smoke over a small town was not necessary. OxyVinyls experts, who made the vinyl chloride for the company, testified to the NTSB that they were sure that the chemical reaction that was feared could have caused the tank cars to explode didn’t happen.
The Ohio governor, first responders, and hazardous materials experts who made this decision said that the information they had on that day led them to believe that an explosion was imminent. They chose the burn despite the risk of releasing cancer-causing dioxins into the area.
The chemical manufacturer has refused to comment on the situation, which is already the subject matter of lawsuits, beyond what its experts stated last spring.
Norfolk Southern announced last Thursday that it will lead a industry-wide study to examine how to improve the decisions made about vent-and-burn in future derailments. This was part of the settlement it reached with the federal government.
The NTSB also examined the difficulties faced by first responders, who did not immediately know what was in the train after 38 cars had jumped off of the tracks. Many cars spilled their contents and caught fire.
Federal officials finalized Monday a new rule that will require railroads inform first responders immediately after a train derailment what is on the train. The industry claims that more than 2 million first responders have immediate access to this information via the AskRail mobile app, which allows them to check out any train’s freight.
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Funk and Krisher contributed this story, both from Omaha, Nebraska.