“Ohio Residents Monitor Air Quality After Train Derailment”
EAST PALESTINE, Ohio (AP) — It’s unclear when evacuated residents may be able to return to the area where officials released toxic chemicals from the wreckage of a derailed train and burned it, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said Tuesday.
Residents near the site in eastern Palestine, near the Pennsylvania Line, were warned in advance to vacate the site due to the risk of death or serious injury from toxic fumes. Flames and black smoke billowed into the sky Monday night as crews released and burned vinyl chloride from five derailed tankers that were in danger of exploding.
DeWine said on Fox & Friends Tuesday morning that officials are closely monitoring air quality outside the immediate area and that it’s “so far, so good.” Ohio National Guard members wearing protective gear are expected to be dispatched to the area closer to the site with sensors to check the air, he said.
Residents just outside the evacuation zone in eastern Palestine and neighboring Beaver County, Pennsylvania have been urged to stay indoors as a precaution.
Authorities assumed that most, if not all, of the residents of the danger zone had left. They went through the area three times trying to get people out before releasing the vinyl chloride, DeWine said.
Officials warned that controlled burning would release phosgene and hydrogen chloride into the air. Phosgene is a highly toxic gas that can cause vomiting and breathing difficulties and was used as a weapon in World War I.
Releasing it during the day allowed the fumes to disperse more quickly, preventing the railroad cars from exploding and sending splinters and other debris flying through the neighborhood, said Scott Deutsch of rail operator Norfolk Southern Railway.
“We can’t control where that goes,” he said.
The process involves using a small charge to blast a hole in the cars, allowing the material to enter a ditch and burn off before being released into the air, he said. The crews handling the controlled release would certainly have done so before, Deutsch said.
About three hours into the proceedings, Norfolk Southern issued a statement saying experts and first responders breached the train cars, chemicals were burning off and the train cars were expected to remain empty for several hours.
The site is very close to the state line and the evacuation area extends into a sparsely populated area of Pennsylvania. About half of eastern Palestine’s 4,800 residents had been warned to leave the country over the weekend before officials decided Monday to use the controlled release.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said the evacuation zone included about 20 Pennsylvania homes and was told residents had left within a mile (1.6 km) of the controlled burn.
About 50 cars, including 10 carrying hazardous materials, derailed in a burning accident Friday night while traveling from Madison, Illinois, to Conway, Pennsylvania, according to Norfolk Southern and the National Transportation Safety Board. No injuries were reported to crew members, local residents or first responders.
Federal investigators say a mechanical problem with a rail car’s axle caused the derailment.
Five derailed cars were transporting vinyl chloride, which is used to make the hard plastic resin polyvinyl chloride in plastic products and has been linked to an increased risk of liver and other cancers, according to the federal government’s National Cancer Institute.
Forced evictions began on Sunday night after authorities were alerted the carriages could explode after a ‘drastic change in temperature’ was observed in one carriage.
The Associated Press
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