[HN Gopher] Vinyl Chloride and the Ohio Train Derailment
___________________________________________________________________
Vinyl Chloride and the Ohio Train Derailment
Author : georgecmu
Score : 79 points
Date : 2023-02-19 23:19 UTC (23 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.mcgill.ca)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.mcgill.ca)
| loeg wrote:
| The subtitle raises a great question "Why was such a large amount
| of this chemical being transported by rail in the first place?"
| which the article wholly fails to address, for some reason. (It
| addresses the industrial applications of the chemical, but
| doesn't ever dive into the "being transported by rail" part.)
| virtuallynathan wrote:
| How else would it be transported? Rail seems like a
| safe/efficient way of doing so.
| cdiddy2 wrote:
| It can be made on site where it is going to be used.
| Generally combined with a manufacturing plant
| red-iron-pine wrote:
| So how do you get the precursors to the plant? You're
| either transporting chlorine, or you're manufacturing it in
| huge quantities locally, which has plenty of it's own
| headaches.
|
| Either trucks or trains, and trains are more cost
| effective.
| pixl97 wrote:
| Are railcars filled with pure chlorine any better? Chlorine
| gas leaks are deadly.
|
| Unless you're talking about in situ chlorine production,
| which has its own list of issues.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| I noticed that as well, but the conclusion is "it's all about
| money (not safety)". I presume the answer to "why was..." is
| the same answer.
| BuyMyBitcoins wrote:
| Rail freight is almost always more cheap, efficient, and safe
| compared to trucking the same cargo. You also benefit from
| economies of scale, as adding extra rail cars doesn't take as
| much manpower as sending out another truck.
| mrbombastic wrote:
| It does though?, PVC is manufactured using this chemical and
| rail is an efficient means of transporting it, it is not much
| deeper than that.
| thallium205 wrote:
| Yeah and the author said it was the third most used plastic.
| Pretty much answered it there.
| loeg wrote:
| > It does though?, PVC is manufactured using this chemical
| and rail is an efficient means of transporting it,
|
| I agree that it addresses the utility of PVC. I wrote: "It
| addresses the industrial applications of the chemical." But
| the article never makes the claim that rail is an efficient
| means of transporting it. It also never answers why the
| chemical cannot be made on-site.
| danielsju6 wrote:
| From what I heard most countries don't allow this chemical to
| be transported, only produced on site with much safer to
| transport precursors.
| Accujack wrote:
| Not exactly "safe". The precursors are ethylene and
| chlorine. Chlorine everyone knows about - it's quite a bit
| more of a problem when it spills than vinyl chloride.
|
| Ethylene is a "colorless and combustible gas used to
| fumigate some agricultural products, sterilize medical
| equipment and in the production of other industrial
| chemicals. The gas is a carcinogen that has been linked to
| breast, lymphoid, leukemia and other types of cancers."
|
| Ethylene is transported as a cryogenic liquid, which means
| when it leaks it immediately boils to gas form. Once
| released it takes 2 to 4 days to break down in the
| atmosphere. Chlorine takes years.
| scythe wrote:
| >The precursors are ethylene and chlorine
|
| The precursors are more accurately acetylene and hydrogen
| chloride. But acetylene can be stored and transported as
| the solid calcium acetylide (aka calcium carbide), which
| releases acetylene by reaction with water. So this is
| potentially easier than you made it sound.
| candiddevmike wrote:
| I thought chlorine breaks down rather quickly in
| sunlight?
| McSwag wrote:
| I'm not a chemistry expert; Do the precursors' properties
| necessarily matter here?
|
| Like Table salt for example: sodium chloride. Sodium
| spontaneously ignites in AIR and is explosive in water.
| Chlorine is highly toxic and poisonous. But you bond the
| two chemically and you get a stable, safe, delicious
| flavor enhancer.
|
| Edit: Perhaps I misunderstood your comment. Are you
| saying that transporting the raw chemicals required to
| make it on site wouldn't be any safer to transport?
| geysersam wrote:
| How else should it be transported? By truck?
| beebmam wrote:
| By truck (or by plane!) sounds even more dangerous, to me
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| The conventional alternative are pipelines, but for small
| loads such as vinyl chloride they would likely be problematic
| even ignoring the likelihood of eventual leaks.
|
| A better alternative is to keep using trains, but have
| sufficient protection built in to survive a derailment and
| fires.
| mindslight wrote:
| All but one vinyl chloride tank did survive the derailment
| intact! Vinyl chloride is a gas at standard temperature and
| pressure, and so AFAICT it's transported in insulated
| tanks, staying cool enough throughout its journey to be at
| a manageable pressure (<~200psi). The adjacent fire meant
| the clock was ticking on how long before it would rise in
| pressure and be vented through the tanks' relief valves. It
| was then a deliberate decision to preemptively vent the
| tanks and burn the contents. A lot of hubbub is being made
| about the chemical, but in the gamut of chemistry it's
| really not that bad of a chemical nor are its combustion
| products, at least as far what has been demonstrated.
|
| I'm not throwing that out there as a justification for
| deliberately releasing industrial quantities of chemicals
| into the environment (including residential areas), but
| rather examining the decision process. An alternative
| approach would have been bringing in mobile chillers and
| replacement tank cars to cool and recover the vinyl
| chloride. But of course that would have cost more than
| simply discarding the product. Everyone is talking about
| railroad safety, and that needs addressing for sure. But
| the situation with the vinyl chloride specifically was a
| direct result of a deliberate decision, and not accidental.
| If we want this decision process to be different in the
| future, then we need to focus on that.
| bagels wrote:
| It's going to take a lot of pipelines to transport every
| hazardous substance this way.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| I think there are ways to use a single pipeline for
| multiple kinds of loads (in serial), but yeah a bunch of
| new pipelines would be needed to get the loads to a bunch
| of new places.
| giardini wrote:
| _" single pipeline for multiple kinds of loads (in
| serial)"_ <--recipe for pipeline explosion.
|
| Who wants a pipeline behind their home that transports
| chlorine gas one hour and ethylene gas the next?
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Like this one ?
|
| https://channelnz.com/what-we-do/terminal-pipeline-
| services
|
| Not sure how dangerous it would be though to have one
| transport wildly different chemicals...
| deelowe wrote:
| Require it to be produced on site just like many other
| hazardous chemicals.
| serf wrote:
| it's one of the best means to transport lots of something, and
| many industrial chemical groups have buildings that have
| railroad tie-ins that facilitate direct unloading from the car.
| bagels wrote:
| How do you propose it be transported?
| gnopgnip wrote:
| Transport less dangerous chemicals, less dangerous finished
| products and only make the dangerous intermediaries onsite
| pixl97 wrote:
| And what about the 100's of billions in fallout regarding
| this massive shift in US manufacturing?
| danielsju6 wrote:
| Oh no, some billionaires will need smaller yachts.
| asdff wrote:
| More like billionaires will short that stock and get
| bigger yachts, while huge swaths of this country see job
| loss with no replacement or much of a social safety net.
| bsder wrote:
| Why do you believe that the regulations for the onsite
| manufacturing of chlorine or ethylene are going to be any
| better?
|
| The issue is that the companies have been playing fast and
| loose with safety. If you don't choose to reverse _that_ ,
| it doesn't matter whether you transport the chemical or
| manufacture it on site.
| testTED wrote:
| During travel the other day, I saw a molten sulfur train
| car.
| jjtheblunt wrote:
| I read elsewhere (perhaps NYT or WSJ, but i can't find it from
| days ago) that rail is most safe, statistically.
|
| If so, it remotivates an analogue of TCP's MTU: if the size of
| shipments were small, but the number of shipments high, would a
| single "packet loss"/derailment be less catastrophic?
| abigail95 wrote:
| public really hate pipelines
| spants wrote:
| "Most of these leaked out of the cars without vapourizing and
| ended up in the Ohio river causing some damage to wildlife."
|
| SOME? I have seen lot of pictures that show a complete anhilation
| of the local fish population and contamination of the water
| supplies (strange deposits when boiled).
|
| I think that there is a huge coverup ongoing.
| op00to wrote:
| Please provide said photos, and while you're at it, proof that
| these photos are indeed recent and taken in the watershed
| affected by the incident.
|
| I hear this over and over and over, but I've never seen actual
| evidence that these pictures are authentic AND reflect the
| widespread condition of the area.
| McSwag wrote:
| I honestly haven't seen much detailed information in the
| major news outlets other than there was a train derailed, a
| burn, some fish died, some people were evacuated, everything
| okay and safe now, "by the way we shot down some UFOs", "do
| aliens exist?"
|
| It's possible I'm missing something but for whatever reason I
| don't feel like it's getting the coverage it really deserves
| which, by itself, raises questions.
| op00to wrote:
| It's the only thing I've heard about. I think there's some
| rat fuckery going on, I agree. I'm not so sure it's a cover
| up orchestrated or enabled by the government as much as
| other actors using the opportunity to stoke distrust in the
| government.
| scotty79 wrote:
| Should all involved companies be sued/fined into oblivion? If
| not, why not?
| jjeaff wrote:
| I'm in favor of a corporate death penalty. In cases where a
| company is found guilty of gross negligence leading to terrible
| disasters and loss of life, give a jury the option to give the
| death penalty. All equity holders AND debt holders are washed
| out and the assets are sold off to pay victims and severance
| pay for low level employees.
| ticviking wrote:
| Revoking their charter and seizing their assets seems just
| for a lot of this stuff.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| Their charters are often from other states (such as
| Delaware). This would complicate the issue by entwining
| state's rights and federal rights.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| For the USA, an easy mechanism for a corporate death penalty
| (for large enough corporations) without running afoul of
| takings clause would be to bar the corporation from engaging
| in interstate commerce, and to bar the equity holders from
| selling to themselves or relatives.
| torstenvl wrote:
| If you're talking about judicial action, the Takings Clause
| isn't a problem. If you're talking about Congressional
| action, your proposed alternative runs into the prohibition
| on Bills of Attainder.
|
| In my view, the L&E approach of punitive damages calculated
| to be greater than the profit incentive of the
| negligent/reckless behavior is the best approach.
| Additionally, to the extent that an executive's actions
| were clearly not in the long-term interest of the
| corporation, they should be made personally liable.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| To avoid the bill of attainder issue the companies
| wouldn't be individually named. All corporations that fit
| the bill would be subject to the bill. And since Congress
| is forbidden from passing ex post facto laws, such a law
| would obviously not be a bill of attainder, as it could
| not guess who would be subject to it.
|
| IANAL. I believe that there are limits to the penalties a
| judicial action can impose. A corporate death penalty
| presumably wouldn't survive appeals without an underlying
| law. I guess the 8th amendment might still be a barrier
| to my alternative.
|
| > In my view, the L&E approach of punitive damages
| calculated to be greater than the profit incentive of the
| negligent/reckless behavior is the best approach.
|
| I agree. But I also want a corporate death penalty beyond
| this.
| refurb wrote:
| Are you willing to lose your job because your CEO did
| something wrong?
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| No. But that has never stopped a layoff.
|
| It would be better to do this the way the FDIC treats
| failed banks: sell off obligations of the company,
| including buildings, equipment, and employees, to
| competitors. For a straightforward business such as a train
| logistics company with direct competitors who do
| effectively the same business, this seems relatively
| simple.
| refurb wrote:
| Selling to competitors sounds like a great way to create
| monopolies and perverse incentives.
|
| Your idea is full of holes.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| You do know that the FDIC requires spin offs as necessary
| to eliminate monopolies?
| sqeaky wrote:
| Under such a system I wonder if people who quit from unsafe
| jobs more often because the companies would be perceived as
| less stable.
|
| Even if a purely free market solution doesn't work the
| employees could be lumped in with victims as the assets are
| liquidated. Bankruptcy courts handle more complex but
| similar situations already.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| Norfolk Southern has a 54 billion dollar market cap. Punitive
| damages are often capped as a percentage of actual damages, and
| proving enough actual damages for the total damages to
| materially harm Norfolk Southern is a big reach.
| asdff wrote:
| Because they don't price actual damage accordingly. How much
| would you price you getting cancer at? For me I would price
| that at a few billion easily, because I value my life quite
| high. I'm sure bill gates would put the price of him getting
| cancer in the billions too. There's of course no telling
| which child you are harming in the ohio river valley might be
| the next bill gates, so you might as well price them all at
| that valuation. That would put the costs of remediation well
| beyond what northfolk southern's market cap is, and would
| justify either closure or if its truly essential, having
| those assets and infrastructure being taken over by the
| public, much like how any other debt collection agency would
| take your assets if you lack liquidity.
| sqeaky wrote:
| Punitive damages are broken and this is one of the many
| reasons why.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Maybe. But ultimately, they're a symptom. Per the last
| paragraph, it's Congress that dropped the ball.
| [deleted]
| voisin wrote:
| Punishing the company into bankruptcy is one thing, but the
| company is made up of individuals who will go work at other
| companies and likely escape lawsuits since they were operating
| within the umbrella of their job. So ultimately the
| shareholders who weren't involved in the catastrophe will be
| punished and not the people that ultimately caused the issue.
|
| No argument from me that the shareholders should take a major
| financial loss (they should demand better safety controls), but
| to prevent this from happening again (which I think is the key
| goal, rather than plain old retribution), I am arguing that
| there should be strict liability for the individuals as well -
| throw them in jail, bankrupt them, etc, so that a message is
| sent that employees of all companies owe, at a minimum, a duty
| of care to protect the safety of the general public.
| Essentially take away the employees' ability to say "I was just
| following orders to try to maximize shareholder value". Give
| the employees, in response, some protection from being fired
| for upholding this new obligation.
| AmVess wrote:
| This is the only approach that will work. Punish all those
| involved with stiff criminal charges and punishments that
| include jail time and loss of all personal assets. Avoidable
| incidents like these would become a thing of the past.
| scotty79 wrote:
| > who will go work at other companies and likely escape
| lawsuits since they were operating within the umbrella of
| their job.
|
| And who'll exactly hire people responsible for the death of
| their previous company?
| voisin wrote:
| It happens all the time. Do you think the accounting
| employees of Enron are all unemployed right now? People
| downplay their involvement.
| vondur wrote:
| I assumed that's why they burned the gas off. It produces
| hydrochloride acid, while initially very dangerous, it will
| eventually be diluted into the environment. The effects of which
| you can see on the melting paint on nearby cars. I thought this
| stuff was transported in two walled containers. Apparently not.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| > Neither was it equipped with electronically controlled
| pneumatic brakes, a safety measure that the railway industry
| lobbied against vigorously when Congress proposed a law to have
| them installed on trains because of the costs involved.
|
| Safety has a cost. Lack of safety has a cost. The former the cost
| is financial. The latter it's lives, peace of mind, health, etc.
|
| One is replaceable. One is not. Sadly Congress protected the
| replaceable one.
| chii wrote:
| > One is replaceable.
|
| cost is cost. You can put a financial figure on lives, health,
| peace of mind etc. Insurance companies do this every time they
| insure something.
|
| So the question really is whether the cost of safety will
| outweigh the economic loss of implementing that safety.
| sqeaky wrote:
| Insurance companies doing this to help people manage risk and
| are often attempting to help people in moments of grief and
| tragedy, and those people opted into the contract.
|
| Train companies doing this to unsuspecting towns are
| stochastic monsters killing people because the victims are a
| financial externality and therefore cheaper dead than alive.
| They knew that a disaster could happen but chose good balance
| sheets over externalized risk.
|
| Boiling this down to pure economics is monstrous; Flip this
| around. What if I get to decide if you live or die based on
| my spreadsheets?
|
| Clearly the dollar value of thing isn't the only thing that
| matters. We should make these as safe as we can afford to, to
| the point that mass death or even mass destruction doesn't
| happen while billionaires are made from it. We can't afford
| infinite safety but while we can afford more safety we
| should. It is even correct from a macroeconomic standpoint,
| people who don't die or suffer from disasters go on to be
| more productive in the economy than dead people.
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| In theory. But would you (and fam) trade places with anyone
| living in that area? For 2x the price the insurance company
| would pay?
| mikeyouse wrote:
| The real problem with this math is that the cost of the
| braking system would be borne by the company, but the costs
| of the derailment are borne by the public. So even if the
| derailment cost >>> the brake system cost, it's an easy
| decision for the industry to make. That whole privatized
| profits / socialized losses issue that keeps showing up.
| moremetadata wrote:
| > That whole privatized profits / socialized losses issue
| that keeps showing up.
|
| The Banksters demonstrated that back in 2008.
| freejazz wrote:
| I think it's understood that sometimes we need to reflect the
| value of a human life in monetary terms, but to act as if
| human lives provide no value beyond actuarial valuations is
| pretty horrific
| onetimeusename wrote:
| I am not convinced electronically controlled pneumatic brakes
| would have made a big difference here[1] during an emergency
| stop. Some difference, sure. But keep in mind that 50 cars out
| of 141(IIRC) derailed. This is not a defense of any specific
| policy. I just think people are treating the EPC brakes as if
| they would have completely prevented the accident.
|
| [1]:
| https://www.ntsb.gov/news/events/Documents/2017_casselton_BM...
| washadjeffmad wrote:
| ECP brakes are generally per train and freight car or car
| block. Any single car or block installed with them likely
| wouldn't haven't made a difference, but more probably, in an
| environment with lax adherence to (or even avoidance of)
| safety technology guidelines, there is no guarantee that an
| ECP braking system would have been operably configured and
| maintained.
|
| In the condition this train was at, whether they were
| equipped or not is irrelevant, because they'd more than
| likely just have been expensive decorations.
| onetimeusename wrote:
| Even assuming they performed optimally, the reduction in
| stopping distance would not have been anywhere near 100%.
| It depends on train length, weight, and speed, and some
| other train car standards but a mean estimate would be a 13
| to 39% reduction in the stopping distance. How many less
| cars does this translate to as far as a derailment? This
| study [1] suggest 20% less. Contrast that with an official
| saying that ECP brakes would have "avoided that monster
| pile up"[2]. If 50 cars derailed then maybe we could see
| ten fewer cars derailing in a similar accident. Is that
| worth it? I don't know. But I don't believe it would have
| completely prevented it.
|
| [1]: https://www.gao.gov/assets/690/680555.pdf
|
| [2]:
| https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2023/02/14/norfolk-
| south...
| takeda wrote:
| they would likely reduce the number of derailed cars
| eurticket wrote:
| In my limited knowledge weren't ecp brakes part of the
| ability is to prevent large trains from derailing, and being
| able to stop independently?
|
| The older braking system, that was currently installed on
| those trains, has more points of failure.
| htag wrote:
| It's becoming more clear that in the US health and safety are
| taking a back seat to corporate profits. It's shameful to read
| safety equipment that could have prevented this derailment was
| lobbied against by the railway industry.
| lettergram wrote:
| <Insert "always has been" meme>
|
| By definition the EPA, FDA, etc give corporations protections
| from events, not the other way around.
|
| For instance, even if a company is provably causing me harm,
| say through a drug injury, I can't sue the company for false
| advertising -- FDA approved.
|
| How about the EPA? Same deal, I can't sue a company for causing
| me injuries due to carbon dioxide, so long as they follow EPA
| regulations. Historically, before all these agencies you could
| sue for any injury that caused harm (ie the law).
| sqeaky wrote:
| You present a view preposterously one-sided.
|
| The FDA fines and sues companies not following the rules.
| They set a floor for behavior and mitigate frivolous
| lawsuits. This help companies and society, this is better for
| both. This isn't a pie we are dividing, this is complex
| system we are building together.
|
| The current system isn't perfect but things are clearly
| better with than without. Businesses know what they can and
| can't be sued for and overall less bad shit happens to the
| populace. It isn't like I have the ability to sue people
| dumping CO2 into the air. Because lawsuits need more than
| someone polluting, they need someone to break a rule or cause
| direct harm and for the victim to know who to sue and have
| money to do it with
|
| We could theoretically make these systems better by making
| the rules better and sometimes we even do.
| krolden wrote:
| No offense but this was clear since the 70s, if not earlier.
| hotpotamus wrote:
| Where humans and heavy machinery interact, there have always
| been financial incentives to capital to look the other way
| over safety concerns. There's some really great footage from
| GM plants in the 30's from a film they made "Master Hands"[0]
| that shows workers handling red-hot cranks with hand tools in
| massive forges and other working conditions that would get
| them immediately shut down by OSHA today. Those regulations
| came out of the labor movements of the New Deal and the
| war/post-war.
|
| I think the most damning thing is that cases of black lung
| are actually on the rise in Appalachia in the 21st century
| because companies have managed to slacken worker protections
| for coal miners.
|
| [0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pr8rCNaASlc
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Tangentially, from what I hear, proffesional blacksmiths
| prefer to work without gloves, accepting the risk of burns
| compared to the better grip it gives them.
|
| Where it becomes an issue, is indeed when you are not your
| own master, and the risk and profit being borne by
| different people cause warped incentives...
| jerkstate wrote:
| I read a quote that electronically controlled brakes could have
| prevented this, but haven't heard a good explanation of why
| (based on the initial NTSB reporting that the cause was a
| failed wheel bearing) - I looked up the ex-government person
| who the quote was attributed to and they now seem to work in
| private industry selling electronic control systems for trains.
| Not to definitively say the safety equipment mentioned that was
| lobbied against would not have prevented this disaster, but do
| you know more about it?
| mikeyouse wrote:
| So the traditional brakes use a stream of air to actuate the
| brakes down the line, the 'signal' in these brakes travels at
| roughly 1,000ft/second. The train in Ohio was 151 cars long
| and over 9,000 feet long, so from the moment the conductor
| tries to emergency brake, it would take over 9 seconds for
| the cars at the tail of the train to even begin braking vs.
| electronically controlled ones which brake instantaneously.
|
| The ECP wikipedia gets into a lot of the details, but by
| evenly braking instead of the first cars braking and getting
| "pushed" by the back ones, you limit the risk of derailment
| by some amount.
|
| The counterfactual of "what would have happened" with them is
| hard to answer with any certainty, but much less kinetic
| energy in the system and more even braking could have only
| helped.
| e40 wrote:
| There was a really good comment on reddit that I duplicated here
| (with references to original):
| https://e40.github.io/2023-02-18-train-safety.html
|
| It explains _why_ there are so many derailments these days.
| giardini wrote:
| This. Great link that shows the RR car spewing sparks miles
| before the spill.
| gruez wrote:
| >Dems backed it because they didn't want the optics from a rail
| strike paralyzing shipping, and the GOP backed it because
| they're the GOP and do anything for their pocketbooks.
|
| Yet, most of the nays came from the GOP and in the house most
| GOP voted _against_ the bill?
|
| https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2022490
| verall wrote:
| Yet the GOP filibustered the version which would have given
| the 7 days of sick time that rail workers requested:
|
| https://theintercept.com/2022/11/30/rail-workers-strike-
| hous...
|
| The bill that did pass with bipartisan support was a
| compromise due to this bill failing. It is extremely
| disingenuous to suggest that the democrats, who voted
| overwhelmingly for a bill that satisfied more rail worker
| demands, hold most of the fault for the strike break.
|
| The GOP correctly realized that by voting against rail
| workers, they could force democrats to also vote against rail
| workers in order to avoid a general rail strike which would
| be disastrous to the economy and laid at the feed of the
| Biden administration. This is the realpolitik world we live
| in, and peoples health will suffer due to it.
|
| Oh and democrats do share some of the blame, just not the
| majority. Joe Manchin did vote against the bill supporting
| rail workers.
| goostavos wrote:
| Can a smart person explain what that bill means? The
| summary[0] reads like the government just saying "you'll take
| the existing terms and like it" (I didn't know that the
| government could do this). Is that the same thing as making
| it "illegal to strike" as the linked comment suggests?
|
| How does all this work?
|
| [0] https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-joint-
| res...
| arthurfm wrote:
| Wendover Productions posted an interesting train-related video
| recently.
|
| https://youtu.be/qQTjLWIHN74?t=466
|
| It would appear that the issues with Amtrak can be traced back
| to freight rail as well. See 07:46 onwards for more details.
| e40 wrote:
| Very interesting, indeed. The issues in this video with the
| track issues ... what a shitshow.
| [deleted]
| 29athrowaway wrote:
| Corruption
| dang wrote:
| Maybe so, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to HN.
| Accujack wrote:
| Sadly, the author of this article doesn't provide any proof of
| his statements regarding chemicals "draining into the Ohio
| river"... he just seems to accept the statements made in other
| news sources without question.
|
| Here's the latest news from Cincinatti:
|
| https://www.cincinnati-oh.gov/water/news/ohio-river-test-res...
|
| Various conspiracy minded and politically motivated groups
| continue to push the Ohio derailment as some sort of
| environmental apocalypse in social media and elsewhere online
| when the evidence seems to indicate the spill was successfully
| contained.
| mikeyouse wrote:
| The EPA reported the runoff into local creeks and damage to
| aquatic wildlife.. and further testing found at minimum ethyl
| hexyl acrylate in a creek that directly drains into the Ohio
| River.. not sure how much more "proof" you'd need for that..
|
| > _Responding crews discovered contaminated runoff on two
| surface water streams: Sulphur Run and Leslie Run. Under Ohio
| EPA oversight, Norfolk Southern emergency response contractors
| installed booms and underflow dams to restrict the flow of
| contaminated water as well as contain and collect floating
| product._
|
| > _U.S. EPA took water samples at the streams and has sent them
| to a laboratory for analysis. Emergency response staff noticed
| impacted aquatic life and notified the Ohio Department of
| Natural Resources and the U.S. Department of Interior. Ohio DNR
| is on site and is assessing the situation and the impacts to
| aquatic life. Downstream water utilities were also notified._
|
| (https://response.epa.gov/site/site_profile.aspx?site_id=1593..
| .)
|
| > _Water quality sampling taken Feb. 10 shows very low levels
| of two contaminants, butyl acrylate and ethyl hexyl acrylate,
| in Leslie Run which dissipates quickly, and no detects of butyl
| acrylate in North Fork Little Beaver Creek or Little Beaver
| Creek. There was a much lower level of ethyl hexyl acrylate
| found in North Fork Little Beaver Creek. Little Beaver Creek
| did not have any ethyl hexyl acrylate. No vinyl chloride has
| been detected in any of these waterways. Sulfur Run flows into
| Leslie Run, which flows into North Fork Little Beaver Creek,
| which flows into Little Beaver Creek, which discharges into the
| Ohio River._
|
| (https://epa.ohio.gov/monitor-pollution/pollution-
| issues/east...)
|
| I don't even disagree that this is being slightly overblown if
| you look solely at the nature of the leaked chemicals -- but a
| bit of artistic license in service of fewer derailments and
| chemical leaks seems fair enough.
| Accujack wrote:
| The ends do not justify the means in this case.
| mikeyouse wrote:
| The ends of safer rail infrastructure don't justify the
| means of some people occasionally exaggerating the degree
| of pollution that found the waterways vs the amount that
| was just dumped into the soil or burned? We'll have to
| agree to disagree.
| giardini wrote:
| I wonder if this is somehow related to Congress' recent
| intervention in the railroad strike?
|
| https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/02/01/bnsf-f01.html:
|
| FTFA
|
| _" >Only days after the law was passed, BNSF, Union Pacific and
| Norfolk Southern announced pilot programs to reduce crew sizes
| from two to one.<"_
|
| Norfolk Southern is the railroad company that suffered the Ohio
| spill.
|
| wsws is hardly an unbiased source but they clearly support the RR
| workers.
|
| So this incident could be sabotage or "faked sabotage" (damage
| done to falsely impute malfeasance by the workers/union).
|
| Also saw a video of the train passing thru a prior town with one
| RR car axle spewing sparks.
| delecti wrote:
| The two possibilities seem to be either 1. that they warned
| (among other things) about crumbling infrastructure, and that
| crumbling infrastructure then crumbled, or 2. they did a
| terrorism. I've been hearing about the US's crumbling
| infrastructure for decades, so 1 sure seems a lot more likely.
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