Streams around East Palestine, Ohio, were so badly infected by the disastrous Norfolk Southern derailment last year that some staff members became ill during the cleanup.
Workers who reported headaches and nausea (while blasting compressed air into the creek bed, which releases chemicals from the sediment and water) were sent back to their hotels to rest, according to a report received by The Associated Press on their illnesses.
The effects were not made public last spring, despite residents’ concerns about possible health effects from exposure to the long list of chemicals spilled and burned after the disaster. The staff’s symptoms, as described in the report, are consistent with what Centers for Disease Control and Prevention staff going door-to-door in the city had reported shortly after the Feb. 3 derailment of 2023.
Since then, some citizens have also reported unexplained skin rashes, asthma and other respiratory problems, as well as serious illnesses, including male breast cancer.
Researchers are still figuring out how many of those fitness disorders could be linked to the derailment and what effect the crisis will have on the long-term fitness of citizens in the region near the Ohio-Pennsylvania border. Many wonder if there will be cancer outbreaks in the future, something that, of course, will not be transparent for years.
Meanwhile, citizens have until August 22 to decide whether to accept up to $25,000, as part of a $600 million class-action settlement with the railroad to compensate them for any long-term health problems. However, accepting this money means giving the right to sue later, when the charge to cover the necessary physical care and express remedies becomes clearer.
Norfolk Southern spokeswoman Heather Garcia said none of the staff members who became ill during the cleanup “reported any persistent or long-term symptoms. “
“The fitness and protection of our employees, contractors and the network has been paramount to the recovery of East Palestine,” Garcia said.
Cleanup work on the creek continued, but about 3 weeks later, another painter became ill. This time, the task stopped completely. Although there have been other cleanup efforts since then, they have stopped the high-pressure air knife tools. .
Independent toxicologist George Thompson, who followed the aftermath of the Ohio shipwreck, said the cleanup companies, overseen by the Environmental Protection Agency, deserved to have known that the paints they were making would release chemicals from the sediments into the air and water. The CTEH also followed the course of the project. And because one of the main waterways, Sulphur Run, passes directly through the city and through sewers under homes and offices, Thompson said it’s possible those chemicals may have simply seeped into buildings.
“You’re just spreading the chemicals to get them out,” Thompson said. “And it just wasn’t an informed resolution at all to use the pneumatic blade. “
Resident Jami Wallace said she lost her voice for two weeks after she got too close to one of the air knifing machines, which was placed near her driveway. She said when the machine was turned on, it felt like being hit by an invisible wall emitting a sweet chemical smell much like when the train derailed.
The CTEH report was presented to Unified Command, the organization overseeing the response to the crisis, which included federal, state and local officials as well as Norfolk Southern, but no one released it despite significant public interest. CTEH senior toxicologist Paul Nony showed that the report had been delivered to the command center and that officials had been alerted to the illnesses.
When CDC staff had health problems (with headaches and nausea) it made headlines across the country.
East Palestine resident Misti Allison said not enough is being done to monitor the long-term effects on community fitness, and this report confirms her fitness concerns. She said this report has never been hidden from the public.
“It’s probably brazen, and it doesn’t happen. I think any kind of information like that, like when CDC workers came to the domain and were delivered in poor health, should be filtered out rather than diminished,” Allison said. “Especially when it comes to human health, nothing can be swept under the rug. “
The East Palestine derailment, which occurred on the afternoon of February 3, 2023, was by far the worst rail crisis since a crude oil drill leveled the small Canadian town of Lac Mégantic and killed another 47 people in 2013. It suggested that national measures will be taken. on railway safety. and calls for reform, even as proposals for new trade regulations have stalled in Congress.
Thirty-eight wagons derailed, 11 of which were wearing hazardous fabrics such as butyl acrylate and vinyl chloride. After the accident, a chimney was destroyed for days. Fearing that the five wagons of vinyl chloride would explode, the government blew them up needlessly and deliberately burned the poisonous plastic ingredients.
This generated a huge column of thick black smoke over the area. The NTSB decided that the decision makers that day never got the key opinion – that the cars were not likely to explode – from the chemical maker.
Major freight railroads responded by pledging to load additional loads of obstacles onto tracks across the country in the event of mechanical problems. They also reevaluated how they respond to alerts and, even before alerts, how they track emerging temperatures due to an overheating wheel bearing.
This summer’s final touch on the NTSB investigation into the twist of fate revived hopes that Congress could pass a rail protection bill, but little action has been taken beyond a House hearing on the topic last month.
CTEH said its environment around the streams showed the presence of elevated levels of a collection of chemicals in the air and sediments. However, the organization did not discover either of the two chemicals of most concern: vinyl chloride or butyl acrylate. Sediment analyses conducted at nine locations along streams where cleanup personnel reported strong odors revealed the presence of 37 other chemical compounds that were primarily hydrocarbons or polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.
As a result, the CTEH said that some of the creek’s pollution came from industries operating in the area years before the 2023 derailment. However, those compounds may also have been created from chemicals burned after the exercise accident.
Nony, lead toxicologist at CTEH, said his company’s role in the spraying operation was primarily to monitor air quality.
The EPA said it doesn’t believe people are frequently exposed to toxic chemicals because no specific levels of chemicals have been found in its air and water tests since the evacuation order was lifted.
In follow-up tests this year, the company discovered small amounts of vinyl chloride and other chemicals at the crash site, although it cited only small amounts and the fact that infected soil was removed, the company said they posed no risk. to human health.
The overall clean-up effort in Palestine is expected to conclude by the end of this year.