Mary Pintea – News Editor

mvp5879@psu.edu

Thousands of East Palestine, OH residents have been displaced after a train carrying toxic vinyl chloride derailed and exploded on Feb. 8, leaving transportation officials wary of future disasters. 

To eliminate the chemical wastes, officials decided to perform a controlled burn to prevent a much more dangerous explosion. Unfortunately, the trade-off is unfavorable: leave the chemicals in their current place and patiently wait for a blast, or burn them and create phosgene, another toxic chemical. 

Phosgene is a highly toxic gas weaponized during the first world war. Inhalation can cause vomiting and breathing trouble, so removing residents from the surrounding areas was essential to perform the chemical release. 

While there were no fatalities in the accident, the catastrophe is a wake-up call to the potential for deadly freight rail derailments. Data from one estimate indicates that approximately 25 million Americans live in an oil train blast zone. Had the derailment occurred just a few miles east, the accident would have impacted downtown Pittsburgh, displacing thousands of residents and causing immeasurable damages. 

Ineffective oversight from a largely self-monitored industry, which has cut the nation’s rail workforce, puts record profits over safety is inherently responsible for the wreck, said Ron Kaminkow, an Amtrak locomotive engineer and former Norfolk Southern freight engineer.

“The Palestine wreck is the tip of the iceberg and a red flag,” said Kaminkow, Secretary of Railroad Workers United. This non-profit labor group coordinates with the nation’s rail unions. “If something is not done, it’s going to get worse, and the next derailment could be cataclysmic.”

About 4.5 million tons of toxic chemicals are shipped via rail annually, with an estimated 12,000 rail cars carrying hazardous materials directly through cities and towns daily. 

Recent accidents plagued several cities, including Lac-Megantic, Quebec, in 2013, when a runaway train exploded. In February 2020, a crude oil train exploded in a town in Saskatchewan, a province in Canada, and an ethanol train in Kentucky burst only a week after derailing. 

While the region is not seeing trains with toxic wastes derailing, Pittsburgh notes that there have been eight train derailments over the last five years. Around 1,700 derail annually nationwide. 

The causes of the Pittsburgh accidents highlight the plethora of ways things can go wrong. A crack in a track ignored by rail companies caused a 2018 derailment, while another train hit a dump truck with inadequate safety equipment at a crossing. A broken axle on a train car is thought to be the source of the East Palestine accident.

Projected to increase throughout the region, rail accidents may go up with the creation of a new Shell oil plant. Rail infrastructure, like tracks and bridges, is in a precarious state, said Glenn Olcrest, founder of RPPP.

“The railroads are playing Russian roulette with Pittsburgh,” he said. “We are a prime candidate for a major derailment and explosion.”

The US transportation department approved a rule in 2020 allowing liquified natural gas, or LNG, to be shipped via rail with no additional safety regulations. The legislation passed despite heavy opposition from local leaders, unions, and fire departments, who cited that the risks were too high. 

In recent years, rail companies laid more than 20,000 workers during 2018-2019: the most extensive layoffs in the industry since the Great Recession; as a whole, the nation’s rail force has dipped below 200,000 – the lowest level ever, down from 1 million at its peak.

“They have cut the hell out of the workforce, and there are big plans to cut it further,” Kaminkow said. “Just because the rail companies are profitable doesn’t mean they’re healthy.”