Norfolk Southern, the American railway giant, has found itself in the midst of a train derailment crisis. With two noteworthy derailments in the past two months, Norfolk Southern has vehemently denied that its derailment in East Palestine, Ohio will cause lingering health problems to the citizens of the town.
President Biden said Norfolk will be responsible for air testing and clean up after almost 120,000 gallons of vinyl chloride spilled during the 38-car derailment on February 3rd, 2023. The company has deployed air quality test squads in conjunction with the Environmental Protection Agency to assure residents of the town that they are safe to return to their homes. While there is obvious distrust between Norfolk Southern and the residents of East Palestine, an unexpected group has found themselves in the midst of this controversy: the workers themselves.
In an open letter to U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg sent on March 1st, 2023, an American Rail System Federation official detailed how workers sent to help clean-up the contamination in East Palestine were becoming ill. Workers “inquired about the appropriateness of their personal protective equipment and the safety of their working conditions” and were met with little to no response from Norfolk Southern. J.B. Long, the General Chairman of the ARSF and author of the letter, alerts Secretary Buttigieg that Norfolk Southern is “Dangerous to America.”
Remediation workers and East Palestine residents have a right to be concerned. According to the Center for Disease Control, vinyl chloride is a toxic chemical readily absorbed into the lungs and can cause health issues, including damage to the central nervous system and death. Residents have expressed to multiple news outlets, that they have experienced nausea, headaches, and skin rashes due to chemical exposure.
Although air-quality testers and politicians have vocally reassured residents their homes are safe to enter, the optics hardly fit the narrative. “Right now they’re saying, ‘Oh, our team said they didn’t test anything in the air.’ Well, let’s talk about the soil, let’s talk about the residue, why are people getting sick if it’s… safe,” East Palestine resident Zsuzsa Gyenes told Vice News.
Now, almost three months after the devastating spill, independent testing conducted by a team from Purdue University has found carcinogenic chemicals in the air and water surrounding East Palestine. Andrew Whelton, an engineering professor at Purdue and a member of the testing team, told FOX Business, “Many statements by government agencies were being made about safety. ‘The air is safe, the water safe, your homes are safe.’ But they weren’t actually sharing a lot of the data. And that raised a red flag for us.” Whelton recently wrote a letter to the EPA asking for additional oversight on water testing in East Palestine.
The train derailment in East Palestine, while devastating, is just one of thousands of chemical spills that happen in the U.S. annually. Analysis of EPA data regarding chemical spills conducted by The Guardian found that the U.S. averages two chemical spills a day, causing environmental, health, and economic problems across the country. Even though Norfolk Southern is being held accountable, only time will tell how and when the site is fully cleaned up, and the long-term health implications of the spill. “I definitely don’t trust Norfolk or the team that they hired. I don’t think they should have been given the ability to hold the reins on the narrative,” said Gyenes.