#Vinyl chloride

[jessiarts]

Seeing the difference in coverage (news media vs social media) on the Feb 3rd train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, USA on and all the issues caused by the incident, I want to see something;

The incident summed up (and there may be even more I missed):

train carrying 150 cars, twenty of which contained hazardous materials, derailed due a failure of a wheel bearing, due to poor inspection because inspections were cut from 3 minutes per train to 90 secs per train. (Remember the railroad strike? Yeah. Part of what they wanted, in addition to better conditions, was more time to inspect trains and to get faulty parts fixed. They were refused, and now we're here.)

the derailment (of 50 cars) caused a fire which threatened to make a car(s) with the vinyl chloride explode, so a controlled release (burn) of the vinyl chloride (toxic, flammable gas) was done to prevent this

residents within a 1 mile radius were evacuated beforehand

the event resulted in contamination of the air/water and mass deaths of animals like fish and chickens

residents were told it's safe to return home a week after the evacuation, and found their pets dead; water smells wrong; air smells and/or burns their eyes

People miles away are having the same issues with animals dying (schools of dead fish in water, livestock sick/dying) and water contamination

The chemicals are contaminating the Ohio River Basin (which is more than just the Ohio River, and effects/includes KY, WV, TN, IN, OH, and parts of IL, PA, VA, and NC) and could potentially also lead to the whole Mississippi River Watershed being contaminated. (that's like, 40% of the continental United States and starts to touch into Canada.)

That all said,

Please reblog if you vote so we can get a larger sample size!

Many think the Railroad company (and the government, because they sided with the railroad company in ending the strike) are trying to cover this up in the news as much as possible, and that most coverage is coming from social media (specifically TikTok) and I want to see just how true that is.

I'm not not kidding when I say I have people IRL, who do keep up with the news, who never heard about the derailment at all until I told them just a couple days ago. It doesn't look good.

[oops-all-failure]

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Earlier this month, a train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, triggering a massive fire and forcing everyone within a 1-mile radius of the crash to evacuate. To avoid a potential explosion, officials conducted a controlled detonation of five tankers three days later, sending carcinogenic vinyl chloride into the air. Two days later, residents of the 4,500-person village were told they could safely return home. Many questioned the safety of the air and water supply.

Since then, reporting has made clear that this environmental disaster was less a freak accident than a predictable outcome of lax safety measures and capitalist greed. Here’s what you need to know about the Norfolk Southern rail company.

NORFOLK SOUTHERN CHOSE NOT TO UPGRADE ITS TRAINS’ “CIVIL WAR-ERA” BRAKES.

A report in The Lever notes that the train that crashed in East Palestine was not equipped with Electronically Controlled Pneumatic brakes—fully electric brakes that experts say could have reduced the severity of the crash. Although Norfolk Southern once touted its use of ECP brakes, it lobbied against requiring them on trains carrying hazardous materials. An Obama-era rule required that HHFTs have ECP brakes, but the Trump administration overturned this rule.

NORFOLK SOUTHERN WORKERS DON’T GET PAID SICK TIME.

Remember when the Senate voted to avert a rail strike and deny workers sick leave? Norfolk Southern workers were among those affected. When investors encouraged Norfolk Southern to offer paid sick leave, the company said, OK, we won’t furlough people as often. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT.) has since demanded that rail companies offer workers at least seven days of paid sick leave.

RAIL COMPANIES REFUSE TO HIRE ENOUGH WORKERS.

Unions say that the rail industry’s use of furloughs to reduce the workforce stretches staff too thin. As Timothy Noah wrote in the New Republic, the 141-car train that crashed in East Palestine carried just two crew members and one trainee:

"On February 10, Anya Litvak of The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that security camera footage 20 miles short of where the derailment occurred showed a rail car axle that appeared to be on fire. Why this information was not transmitted quickly to the train crew remains unknown, but it seems likely that the answer has something to do with the number of people who were in a position to sound the alarm."

NORFOLK SOUTHERN HAS SPENT BILLIONS ON STOCK BUYBACKS.

Norfolk Southern made $4.8 billion in operating profit in 2022, More Perfect Union reported, and paid shareholders $4.7 billion in stock buybacks and dividends.

As my colleague Hannah Levintova explained last year:

"A buyback is when companies purchase shares of their own company from investors, driving up the value of the remaining stock because there are fewer shares circulating. Buybacks are taxed at the lower capital gains rate, which maxes out at 20% for the wealthiest households. But for those investors who don’t sell their shares back to the company, there’s no tax—even though the value of their holdings has increased. Until that investor sells the asset, their wealth will grow tax-free. And thanks in part to a tax code loophole that enables the wealthy to pass shares on to their heirs, who can then skip paying capital gains taxes on them altogether, buybacks play a role in building untaxed generational wealth."

THE TRAIN THAT CAUSED THE CLOUD OF SMOKE OVER EAST PALESTINE WAS NOT CATEGORIZED AS A “HIGH-HAZARD FLAMMABLE TRAIN.”

Thanks to pressure from industry lobbyists, the “high-hazard flammable train” categorization applies only to trains carrying a narrow set of materials, like crude oil, The Lever also reported. That designation would have required that the train follow specific speed and braking restrictions.

DESPITE MAKING BILLIONS IN PROFIT, NORFOLK SOUTHERN INITIALLY OFFERED JUST $25,000 TO EAST PALESTINE.

Norfolk Southern managed to scrape together $25,000 for the town that’s been doused in toxic chemicals. People who fled their homes under fear of death can claim $1,000 per person per household. Since then, the company has announced increases in charity.

[insatiablelesbianism]

Norfolk Southern, the US railway company responsible for the toxic spew of vinyl chloride, has now offered a $25,000 donation to assist the area’s nearly 5,000 residents who were ordered to evacuate their homes, or face death.

with $25,000 they could directly pay each resident $5

with $5 they cant put gas in their car to flee. they cant buy respirators. they can't purchase a hotel. they can't buy food on the road - or at all. $5 doesn't take away the irreparable damage to their bodies. cannot take away the effects if carcinogens. cannot bring back the health if their children. their pets. of their live stock.

norfolk southern is worth

$56.18 BILLION DOLLARS

with 56.18 billion dollars they could give each of those 5,000 people

$11,236,000

why is this fucking company not giving every dime they have to TRY to make up to the damage this has on the residents - the PEOPLE living in and around East Palenstine Ohio will forever be affected. Norfold Southern needs to physically pay for what they have done and work with non-police officials to prevent further harm. Norfolk southern needs to invest in their safety. in their employees. this was PREVENTABLE. NEVER LET THIS HAPPEN AGAIN.

please reblog with mutual aid/relief funds and donation centers.

[iliterallydecepticanteven]

As someone living in the area estimated to soon be affected by the Norfolk Southern train derailment and chemical spill in East Palestine, I wanna make one thing clear right now: the people affected by the chemical spill do not "deserve it."

I know there's this weird trend where when a disaster happens in Appalachia or the South, people say that those affected "deserve it" because the state voted majority red or they're backwoods hillbillies or some other insult. No, no we don't. A bunch of rich Republican fucks gerrymandered the hell out of our states so they could stay in office and then didn't help upkeep the infrastructure of the state leading to catastrophes like this. The train derailed because the braking system on the tracks was ancient and hadn't been updated due to politicians not providing funding for upkeep. And now a bunch of people have to live with the consequences while the same bastards who caused this accident can just up and leave and live somewhere safer.

This shit should infuriate you regardless of where you live in the US. Because at the end of the day, something very similar could happen to you.

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this New York Times story:

The Biden-Harris administration said Wednesday that it was taking its first steps toward potentially regulating vinyl chloride, a versatile yet cancerous and flammable chemical used widely to make plastic for PVC pipes and packaging.

Experts and environmental groups had been urging the federal government to more stringently regulate the chemical after a train shipment of it derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, last year, prompting officials to perform a large controlled burn that sent a black cloud of smoke over the surrounding area, raising health concerns.

Tougher rules or a ban on vinyl chloride would address a host of health and safety concerns: The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has classified vinyl chloride as a known human carcinogen, and the chemical is highly flammable and potentially explosive.

Safety experts had also raised concerns over the transport of vinyl chloride across long distances on accident-prone freight trains. The more than 100,000-gallon vinyl chloride shipment that burned in Ohio was on a 1,600-mile journey from a chemicals plant just outside Houston, Texas, to a PVC flooring plant in Pedricktown, N.J.

But tougher regulations would also upend the market for a type of plastic used widely in electrical wiring and cables, blood storage bags and other medical devices, packaging and household goods like shower curtains and raincoats, and PVC pipes for drinking water.

The Vinyl Institute, which represents vinyl chloride manufacturers and related companies, said its members adhered to “some of the most stringent safety and environmental regulations in the chemical industry.” The E.P.A.’s process will “demonstrate the production and use of vinyl chloride are safe,” said the group’s chief executive, Ned Monroe.

[thingstrumperssay]

Of course he did. He rolled back on a lot of stuff Obama put in just because it was Obama who put them in.

All of this shit could’ve been prevented if Trump was never president.

[whats-in-a-sentence]

Table 26.1 gives some examples of polymers formed from compounds related to ethene, along with their common names and most important uses.

"Chemistry" 2e - Blackman, A., Bottle, S., Schmid, S., Mocerino, M., Wille, U.

[mrfogmaxpro]

Train Derailment in Ohio Leads to Evacuation Due to Dangerous Chemical Release

Train Derailment in Ohio Leads to Evacuation Due to Dangerous Chemical Release #TrainDerailment #OhioEvacuation #DangerousChemicalRelease #VinylChloride #GraveDanger #MikeDeWine #EastPalestine

Train Derailment in Ohio Leads to Evacuation Due to Dangerous Chemical Release The Governor of Ohio, Mike DeWine, has issued a warning of a “grave danger of death” in a two-state area around a train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. The reason for the warning is the presence of five train cars carrying the hazardous chemical vinyl chloride. A “controlled release” of the chemical is planned for…

[jessiarts]

Norfolk Southern should be absolutely begging for forgiveness right now, not trying too see how little they can get away with paying the people in East Palestine for the damage they caused.

[nonpracticingintellectual]

:O an actual post from me! I wanted to give my (fully unwarranted and outsider) opinion on the response to the Ohio derailment. Of course, this is all from the experience and perspective of a hazmat technician who hasn't dealt with large scale environmental disasters like this.

Yes, it's scary. Yes, it's dangerous. Norfolk railroad didn't have the *best* response they could've, but in a real life situation nothing ever goes to plan. The one thing they did right is immediate notification of the EPA.

Now, on to current events. Vinyl chloride is an incredibly dangerous chemical, with the only good form of long distance transportation being by train. I cannot state anything about the status of the safety mechanisms on the rail car, however in a derailment it usually doesn't matter as the car gets punctured anyway. Safety wise, the TLV (Threshold Limit Value) is the acceptable value for continual exposure to a worker over an eight hour period is 1 ppm (part per million). A part per million can be equated to a single drop in 10 gallons of water, this is a very low TLV. OSHA also lists their own values, called PEL (permissible exposure limit), which is 1 ppm for vinyl chloride. Of course, these values are weighted for a chemical worker who is exposed 5 days a week for 8 hours a day. During an environmental disaster the short term exposure levels may be set higher based on recovery needs and other factors (such as being outside in an open area). Most of the other chemicals are toxic only with skin contact, however they are miscible in water.

I know there's a lot of worry about the water supply. The inlets and outlets of all water treatment plants, water inflows, etc are constantly monitored (on average a reading is taken every 2 seconds, 24/7/365, with automated systems to shutdown inflows if certain chemical concentrations are exceeded). These chemicals will most likely flow downstream and join the multitude of other chemicals dissolved in the water from leaking ship tanks, shipyards, military sites, etc. I don't forsee any long-term effects to the water supply after the initial bloom passes downstream.

The soil does need to be removed and remediated, and I believe the EPA is investigating why Norfolk's cleanup contractor didn't do that. The EPA is on your side frens, their number one priority is to keep you safe. They are one of the few alphabet soup agencies that has no ulterior motives.

In short, yes this is scary. I understand those who don't want to return, I would be cautious as well. But this isn't the end of the world, the town isn't going to be destroyed. Within a few months the area should be completely back to normal. Modern chemical monitoring equipment is fantastic and allows for blanket networks of monitoring equipment that can detect chemicals down to parts per billion (1 drop of water in 10,000 gallons of water, the average swimming pool) and smaller.

Drink bottled water, reduce time outside, and monitor your physical health. You can worry yourself sick, literally, the brain is an incredible organ, and the placebo effect works incredibly well. The mayor himself lives two blocks away from the accident, this is going to get solved properly.

If you have any questions feel free to send an ask, I love talking about chemical safety and protecting the environment.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Norfolk Southern has agreed to a $600 million settlement to resolve a class action lawsuit related to the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, in February 2023.

The settlement still needs to be approved by a judge.

"If approved by the court, the agreement will resolve all class action claims within a 20-mile radius from the derailment and, for those residents who choose to participate, personal injury claims within a 10-mile radius from the derailment," Norfolk Southern said in a statement.

The spill forced hundreds of nearby residents out of their homes and sparked fears, as five tankers carried vinyl chloride, which posed serious health risks, burned, sending a massive plume of black smoke into the sky. Burning vinyl chloride can create dioxins, which are carcinogenic, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Two days after the crash, residents were evacuated over fears the tankers could explode. The evacuation order was lifted on Feb. 9, with the EPA saying the air had returned to normal levels.

Norfolk Southern outlined how the settlement will be split up: $104 million for community assistance, including $25 million for a regional safety center, $21 million for a park, $21 million in direct payments to residents and $9 million to first responders; $4.3 million to improve water infrastructure; $2 million for "community-directed projects"; and a $500,000 grant for economic development.

"The agreement is designed to provide finality and flexibility for settlement class members," the company wrote. "Individuals and businesses will be able to use compensation from the settlement in any manner they see fit to address potential adverse impacts from the derailment. This could include healthcare needs and medical monitoring, property restoration and diminution, and compensation for any net business loss."

No one was injured in the derailment itself, but residents of the area have complained about a variety of nagging health issues in the months after the crash.

Ashley McCollum, a resident of East Palestine who lived in a hotel for a year after the derailment and chemical leak, told ABC News earlier this year that her family has experienced issues including "rashing, numbness and tingling in your mouth, ear pain, blood in your ears, hair loss."

The National Transportation Safety Board released a preliminary report from its ongoing investigation into the derailment two weeks after the crash, saying surveillance video showed "what appeared to be a wheel bearing in the final stage of overheat failure moments before the derailment." NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy called the derailment "100% preventable," and said it was "no accident."

The plaintiffs in the case released a joint statement saying the settlement "will provide substantial compensation to all affected residents, property owners, employees and businesses residing, owning or otherwise having a legal interest in property, working, owning or operating a business for damages resulting from the derailment and release of chemicals."

"We believe this is a fair, reasonable and adequate result for the community on a number of levels, not the least of which is the speed of the resolution, and the overall amount of the awards residents can expect, which will be significant for those most impacted by the derailment," said Seth A. Katz of Burg Simpson Eldredge Hersh & Jardine, M. Elizabeth Graham of Grant & Eisenhofer, Jayne Conroy of Simmons Hanly Conroy, and T. Michael Morgan of Morgan & Morgan.

[timmurleyart]

East Palestine Ohio. 💨🚂💥💨⚫️🛢

[juvinadelgreko]

another train has derailed in Ohio.

friendly reminder that Obama passed restrictions on carriers so that accidents like this wouldn’t happen.

guess who repealed them? Trump.

I know we’re angry that Biden hasn’t been more helpful or visited Ohio, but please, remember who the real enemy is.