Cleanup continues on Thursday, Feb. 16, 2023, in East Palestine, Ohio, where residents upended by a freight train derailment are demanding to know if they’re safe from the toxic chemicals.
Lucy Schaly | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via AP
WASHINGTON, D.C. – As the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) probes the cause of a Feb. 3 rail accident that led to toxic chemical discharges in East Palestine, legislators on Friday weren’t waiting for its results to promise action they believe would prevent future disasters.
U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat who toured the crash scene on Thursday, said legislative efforts could include better labeling of train cars that contain hazardous material, setting staffing minimums for trains, requiring adequate inspections of train equipment, and establishing safety requirements for brakes and couplings.
Brown said he’s been discussing potential changes with the U.S. Rep. Bill Johnson, the Marietta Republican whose congressional district includes East Palestine, that might also require railroads to tell communities in advance that hazardous materials are passing through.
“My commitment and goal is to stand up to those lobbyists and do it,” said Brown. “Both make the brakes safer and more effective, and put the label on those trains so people know what’s going through.”
The Norfolk Southern derailment spilled toxic chemicals such as vinyl chloride, butyl acrylate, ethylhexyl acrylate and ethylene glycol monobutyl ether. Federal and state officials, fearing the vinyl chloride tanks would explode, set them afire, creating a massive plume of thick black smoke. Other chemicals seeped into local streams, killing fish and traveling down into the Ohio River. Some residents evacuated and have been living in hotels until they’re convinced their homes are safe.
Gov. Mike DeWine said Tuesday that it was “absurd” that Ohio officials weren’t aware that the train came into the state with hazardous material. He said Congress should take action to address that.
On Friday, DeWine said prior notification wouldn’t have prevented the derailment but it would have enabled state officials to notify emergency responders along the route about potential hazards so they could respond faster and immediately understand the dangers of a chemical spill.
White House officials said Friday that the NTSB is leading the investigation into the cause of the derailment, with support from other parts of the Department of Transportation. After the investigation is complete, the federal government will use its results to ensure accountability and improve railroad safety, the officials said.
They said the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has been looking into the condition of the locomotives and rail cars, the track and other rail structures, signals and and train controls, the railroad’s operating practices as well as the hazardous materials that were on the train itself. FRA Administrator Amit Bose plans to visit the accident site next week.
“USDOT will hold Norfolk Southern accountable for any safety violations found to have contributed to the disaster that has upended lives in East Palestine, OH,” said a statement that Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg posted on Twitter. “We respect the independence of NTSB’s investigation, and its findings will inform all of our actions going forward.”
NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy posted a thread on Twitter Thursday evening to report that her agency is “working vigorously to understand what caused this train derailment — so it never happens again,” and won’t wait until the investigation ends to take immediate safety actions if they’re warranted.
She disputed claims that the accident could have been prevented if a rule proposed during the administration of ex-President Barack Obama requiring railroads to use ECP (electronically controlled pneumatic) brakes hadn’t been stopped during the administration of former President Donald Trump.
Homendy said that rule would have only applied to high hazard flammable trains, while the train that derailed in East Palestine was classified as a mixed freight train, with only 3 placarded Class 3 flammable liquids cars.
“This means even if the rule had gone into effect, this train wouldn’t have had ECP brakes,” Homendy wrote.
Transportation Department officials told reporters Friday that the agency proposed a “High Hazard Flammable Train Rule,” which included the braking requirement, after a 2014 oil train explosion in North Dakota, but its implementation was delayed by an “avalanche” of industry lawsuits. They said Congress asked the transportation department to reexamine its cost benefit analysis of the rules, and delayed implementation of a requirement that stronger hazardous inflammable rail cars be phased in.
“The fastest way to get strengthened rules is for Congress to act,” a transportation department official said. “On any of those items, we’ve already acted. If there’s renewed interest from Congress, we absolutely welcome and are ready to to support their efforts. A rulemaking typically takes years because it requires not just coming up with a rule but opening it up for public comment, completing a cost benefit analyses and then facing those those legal battles, which often draw it out even further. Congress, on the other hand, can act unilaterally and basically avoid that process.”
