East Palestine, Ohio

A couple who moved to the Ohio town chasing the American dream exactly a year before a toxic spill now fear for the health of their 7-week-old baby.

"We'll be paying a mortgage for a house we do not live in," Locke added. "We never in a million years imagined that things would unfold the way that they did," Locke said. They are trying to make it as minimal as possible, and sweep it under the rug. She claimed that many residents were being forced to return to East Palestine because of their finances. Lenny Glavan, a tattoo artist who owns a parlor in East Palestine, told Newsweek on Monday that he had kept his children home from school after they were told to return, claiming the classrooms had not been cleaned. The amount of lives and businesses and homes they have affected is astronomical. When Locke and her husband do return now, it's without their child "because we're terrified to expose our 7-week-old to anything." However, Locke said: "I knew in my gut we had to leave home." A few months later, Locke discovered she was pregnant, and she had the couple's baby boy just before the New Year. On the one-year anniversary of moving to the Ohio border town, at around 11:30 p.m. "There's a real sense of community." [detected several toxic substances in the surrounding environment](https://www.newsweek.com/ohio-train-derailment-toxic-chemicals-list-epa-1780805), including levels [immediately toxic to fish in Sulphur Run](https://www.newsweek.com/hundreds-dead-fish-ohio-train-crash-toxic-chemicals-1780908), a nearby waterway.

Expert cautions that the statement, "We basically nuked a town with chemicals so we could get a railroad open," is irresponsible.

The comment about a "more dangerous explosion" is a bit misleading. The controlled burn of these materials should destroy them and make only carbon dioxide and water. Release the pressure and it becomes a gas. Certainly not the equivalent of pH paper. What is the detection limit? All of these chemicals are relatively short-lived and unlikely to persist for many months, and they have a low affinity to bioaccumulate in human and animal tissue." - Ask for the sampling plans. A very different situation when perceived by the public." I would caution that the outcomes and scenarios available on Wikipedia are often overgeneralized and lack nuance. Five days after a Norfolk Southern train carrying vinyl chloride derailed and exploded near the Ohio-Pennsylvania border, crews ignited a controlled burn of toxic chemicals to prevent a much more dangerous explosion. Local residents of East Palestine, Ohio are wondering whether returning to the area is really safe. [a report](https://www.wkbn.com/news/local-news/east-palestine-train-derailment/3-additional-chemicals-discovered-on-east-palestine-train-derailment/) from television station WXBN in Youngstown, Ohio, it was disclosed that additional toxic chemicals have been discovered in the area.

Emily Wright says her group has warned about the risks of 'bomb trains' for nearly a decade. She says it is time for the Gov Mike DeWine.to call the ...

Tell him people are sick and animals are dying. Tell him the short- and long-term health implications for our region. He is playing politics with our lives from his comfy governor’s mansion a hundred miles away as residents of East Palestine and neighboring communities look on in horror. Tell him to declare a federal emergency so we can get the help that we need. People well outside the evacuation zone have left their homes because the waterways are polluted with chemical smells and dead fish. We have been on the frontline around environmental community hazards in the Appalachian Ohio River Valley for several years. Those same people must now clean their homes or dispose of contaminated items with no assistance offered. In fact, these groups warned the federal government that a disaster was waiting to happen. People are debating whether they can afford another night in a hotel or if they and their children have to go back to their contaminated houses. I live a few short miles from the derailment site. [Reporters](https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/10/ohio-attorney-general-to-investigate-east-palestine-reporter-arrest/69894152007/) are being silenced and even arrested for being “too loud” at press conferences. [environmental nightmare ](https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/2023/02/08/toxic-gases-connected-to-ohio-train-derailment-cause-concern/69885563007/)that corporations and elected officials are sweeping under the rug.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine is going to give another update Tuesday on the train derailment in East Palestine.

An evacuation order was lifted last Wednesday, which came two days after officials conducted a controlled release of chemicals amid explosion concerns. Author: ...

Ohio Governor Mike DeWine will be joined by Cabinet officials to host a press conference to provide a third update on the train derailment in East ...

On Feb. 3, a train derailed in the village of East Palestine, setting off evacuation orders, a toxic chemical scare and a federal investigation.

“The assessment phase that will occur after the emergency is over will help to determine that information.” is still investigating the cause of the derailment. Residents have complained about headaches and feeling sick since the derailment. Just after the derailment, about 1,500 to 2,000 residents in East Palestine were told to evacuate the area. But it installed a secondary intake on the Guyandotte River in case an alternate source was needed. on Feb. 6, and the contents were diverted to a trench and burned off. [said](https://response.epa.gov/site/site_profile.aspx?site_id=15933) it had not detected contaminants at “levels of concern” in and around East Palestine, although residents may still smell odors. [said](https://response.epa.gov/sites/15933/files/Norfolk%20Southern%20East%20Palestine%20Train%20Derailment%20General%20Notice%20Letter%202.10.2023.pdf) that about 20 rail cars were reported to have been carrying hazardous materials. About 50 of the train’s 150 cars ran off the tracks on its route from Madison, Ill., to Conway, Pa. [vinyl chloride](https://response.epa.gov/sites/15933/files/TRAIN%2032N%20-%20EAST%20PALESTINE%20-%20derail%20list%20Norfolk%20Southern%20document.pdf), a toxic flammable gas, being of most concern to investigators. In early February, a train carrying toxic chemicals derailed in eastern Ohio, igniting a fire that swept the town of East Palestine in smoke.

Locals say they have suffered from a range of health issues, while some pets have died, amid fears that the accident has infected the area with toxic ...

Animals have also been suffering as a result of the chemical spill. "I am concerned that the area has been deemed safe so quickly without extensive data to show the risk has been reduced," he said. Michael Koehler, a member of the American Chemical Society's Committee on Chemical Safety, told The New Republic that he fears the process to get residents back home may have been rushed. Therese Vigliotti, who lives 15 miles north of East Palestine and was therefore not included in the evacuation zone, said she had suffered from numb lips, a burning tongue and throat, and even blood in her stools. "Our Federal partners at EPA are onsite and monitoring indoor and outdoor air quality to test for VOCs [volatile organic compounds] and other chemicals of concern," he said. The train had been transporting a range of chemicals when it overturned.

There's enormous uncertainty following the train derailment including about the risks that the chemicals and fire pose. But that uncertainty applies to ...

Because of the complexity of the situation, it’s hard to even evaluate the state of play at the time decisions are being made. While we await that complicated assessment, there is a demand for answers met in part (as Reddy put it) by “uncertainty and myth and misinformation.” There is a market for pithy assessments of the safety or risk of the scene and of the surrounding region, a market addressed, once again, by both good-faith concern and bad-faith opportunists. He emphasized the complexity of the situation. Complexity doesn’t sell in the current information environment. The motivations of the people responding to the spill? [most of the vinyl chloride](https://epaosc.org/sites/15933/files/TRAIN%2032N%20-%20EAST%20PALESTINE%20-%20derail%20list%20Norfolk%20Southern%20document.pdf) — didn’t. (The Environmental Protection Agency is [monitoring](https://response.epa.gov/site/site_profile.aspx?site_id=15933) the air in the region without “detect[ing] anything above the action level” per its update on Monday.) Uncertainty. These are not the bureaucrats. The extent of what was released is unclear. It was, instead, that it’s hard to know how good or bad things are now or will be in the future. But that uncertainty works the other way, too: This is not, at this point, obviously a disaster with necessarily dire long-term local, regional or national health consequences. But the past few years have been particularly rough for institutions that had otherwise held up fairly well: [scientists and medical experts](https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2022/02/15/americans-trust-in-scientists-other-groups-declines/), particularly.