{"id":2368,"date":"2023-02-16T16:14:24","date_gmt":"2023-02-16T17:14:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/malvinartley.com\/blog.malvinartley.com\/?p=2368"},"modified":"2023-02-16T16:14:24","modified_gmt":"2023-02-16T17:14:24","slug":"the-2023-east-palestine-train-derailment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/malvinartley.com\/blog.malvinartley.com\/2023\/02\/16\/the-2023-east-palestine-train-derailment\/","title":{"rendered":"The 2023 East Palestine train derailment"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have had a fascination with trains since I can remember. As a small child my parents used to take me to the rail yards after church on Sunday and let me have a gander at all the rail cars and diesel locomotives. Then one of them would board a passenger train with me for a ride to the next town. The other parent would meet us there. It was a Sunday ritual. The things parents do for their kids. Those days are long gone, but my fascination with trains remains. So, when I hear about a rail incident, like the recent one in East Palestine, OH, I want to know all about it. What follows here are the results of my investigations\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Starting with the event, at 8:55 pm EST on 3 February in East Palestine, OH, a Norfolk and Southern (\u2018NS\u2019 from here on) freight train bound for Conway, Pennsylvania derailed, causing an \u2018environmental incident\u2019. Wikipedia has the following entries:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe derailed train was a Norfolk Southern freight train<\/a><\/span>, which consisted of three locomotives, nine empty cars, and 141 loaded cars<\/a><\/span>. The train was operating from the Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis yard in Madison, Illinois, to Norfolk Southern’s Conway Yard in Conway, Pennsylvania.<\/span><\/p>\n

The train was not equipped with electronically controlled pneumatic brakes<\/strong>, which a former Federal Railroad Administration official claimed would have mitigated the severity of the accident<\/a><\/span>. In 2017, Norfolk Southern<\/strong> successfully lobbied the Trump administration to repeal the regulations requiring the use of such brakes<\/strong> on trains carrying hazardous materials.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019ll have more on the bolded text in a bit, because it is central to what happened. Continuing with Wikipedia:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAround 8:55 pm local time on February 3, 2023, approximately 50 cars derailed in East Palestine, a small village near the Ohio\u2013Pennsylvania border with a population of 4,800 residents. Out of the 141 cars on the train, 20 were carrying hazardous materials, with 14 of them carrying vinyl chloride<\/strong>. Other chemicals present included butyl acrylate, ethylhexyl acrylate, ethylene glycol, monobutyl ether, isobutylene, combustible liquids, and benzene residue.<\/strong>\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Lovely stuff. A complete manifest for the cargo was listed in a PDF by the EPA<\/a><\/span>. From the information above we have the basis for the event chart, which is below (bigger<\/a>):<\/span><\/p>\n

\"C:\\Users\\tian_\\Pictures\\Site<\/span><\/p>\n

This chart has \u2018disaster\u2019 written all over it. We have the following indicators for that:<\/span><\/p>\n