Ohio Train Wreck

[3chester]

Any decision is made upon the chemicals involved, an explosion at a fertilizer plant has no bearing at all upon it. There are highly qualified people in EPA and DOT PHMSA who have the experience in RR derailments versus local officials. The wallflowers smile for PR. The hazards from ALL the chemicals must be evaluated not only for local impact but for potential release outside the defined boundary upon downstream areas. The responsibility is complex and far reaching impacts will now be outside the derailment zones of concern.

N/S RR wanted to avoid a similar explosion to West Fertilizer, with these fires and pressures in the railcars increasing. If it had blown up, still would have released an enormous amounts of chemicals airborne and soils. Who ya gonna send in there to do the slow method? Guy probably had a fairly high pay grade making the calls. So yeah, can see the similarity to TX disaster, both could have been explosions, luckily this one wasn't. Just was not a positive ending any ways, but wrecks rarely end that way.

 

[bdlesh]

Now if this would have happened in downtown ny city, dc or la....I would not be as worried about the inhabitants.

 

[birddog 68]

OOPs. That was supposed to read west of East Palestine.

Don't feel bad Ol' Red, I put west instead of east in post #2 but I did a quick edit.

 

[Mike Matteson]

Any decision is made upon the chemicals involved, an explosion at a fertilizer plant has no bearing at all upon it. There are highly qualified people in EPA and DOT PHMSA who have the experience in RR derailments versus local officials. The wallflowers smile for PR. The hazards from ALL the chemicals must be evaluated not only for local impact but for potential release outside the defined boundary upon downstream areas. The responsibility is complex and far reaching impacts will now be outside the derailment zones of concern.

Got that right. Could be a problem for years to come.

 

[Weaver93]

Precision Scheduled Railroading: Basically 5 ways Class 1 railroads can meet their annual operating ratios. NS has the highest operating ratio of all Class 1s.
1: Speed. All class 1s have increased speeds annually with NS leading the way with approximately 19% increase between 2019-2022
2: Dwell times. The time cars spend stopped in yards or hump tracks Vs. in motion. NS decreased dwell by 30% 2019-2022
3: Cars on line. Less equipment means savings for the railroad.
4: Sell property and holdings. NS has led in this from PSR's start. Only NS and CSX use these values in their ratios.
5: Cut staff and do more with fewer people. In 2002, NS employed 29,000 people. By the end of 2022, the company had reduced that by 33%. NS finished last in PSR rankings in 2022.

Fewer cars, higher speeds, less yard time, smaller staff and heavier, longer trains. NS has been hurting since PSR started.

 

[RidgeTop]

Now there is news some of the 'hot bearing' sensors MAY not have been working.
EPA wants to dispose of contaminated water in 'injection wells' in other States. I don't think that will fly.
Don't know what a injection well is but would think to keep contaminated water away from the aquafer ??

 

[smokey3]

Now there is news some of the 'hot bearing' sensors MAY not have been working.
EPA wants to dispose of contaminated water in 'injection wells' in other States. I don't think that will fly.
Don't know what an injection well is but would think to keep contaminated water away from the aquafer ??

Looking more like environmental sabotage every day. I believe the injection wells are used in fracking for the gas wells

 

[birddog 68]

I think it's highly unlikely that they will ever be able to get all or even close to all the contaminated water and soil. When they exploded the chemicals they were spread for miles from the explosion and wind currents. There's no way to clean it all up!
I live less than 20 miles away and the deer that I hunt and eat will be ingesting these dioxins. I have no clue if it's going to be safe to eat deer harvested locally?

 

[RidgeTop]

I did not know it exploded, I thought they set it on fire.

I called on a Chemical research lab and when they moved PVC from one location to another it was double container and had two Chemists accompany the material.

 

[Weaver93]

Now there is news some of the 'hot bearing' sensors MAY not have been working.

HBD sensors were working according to a buddy that does rail testing for NS and they signaled the crew when the bearings reached something like 250+ degrees, but by that time the train could not stop quick enough.

NS set their HBD sensors at 170 degrees above ambient. The first set it passed showed less than 50 degrees above, second showed 103 degrees above and third showed 250 and some odd degrees and signaled. Crew slowed, but not soon enough and when the cars derailed it went into emergency stop. Still will take well over a mile to full stop. So instead of seeing a temperature increase of 220 degrees over 20 miles, the crew gets the signal to slow and stop at sensor three when temp is almost 90 degrees over what NS says it critical.

They have acoustic sensors now that can detect bearing vibration which is much more efficient datapoints than temps, but is costly to implement. So, I guess when events like this cost more than the sensors, things will change. Worked well for Ford back in the Pinto days.

 

[birddog 68]

I did not know it exploded, I thought they set it on fire.

I called on a Chemical research lab and when they moved PVC from one location to another it was double container and had two Chemists accompany the material.

Actually they exploded it. Not sure who made the call to explode it but the chemist's that I have listened to say that was a terrible idea that made a bad situation way worse.
Here's a picture.

 

[Weaver93]

Actually they exploded it. Not sure who made the call to explode it but the chemist's that I have listened to say that was a terrible idea that made a bad situation way worse.
Here's a picture.

"
DeWine said the decision to move forward with the controlled release ultimately came up to him and the town's fire chief, and he still stands by it.
"When I arrived there that morning, we had a long conversation trying to determine the risk of doing the controlled release versus the risk of doing nothing and waiting," DeWine said during a Friday news conference. "It was a balancing test.""

 

[Muddyboots]

Explosion is not controlled release.

 

[Weaver93]

Explosion is not controlled release.

They cut holes in the cars and set it on fire. Burning PVC creates phosgene, a chemical agent that contributed to the deaths of tens of thousands of people in World War I. It is corrosive to the lungs in very, very small PPMs, but disappears quickly. Also makes Dioxin.

Now you know why NS ran around with waivers for people to sign.