HARRISBURG — Norfolk Southern’s Alan Shaw reiterated his firm’s commitment to communities impacted by the toxic train derailment in Ohio but it’s what he didn’t tell Pennsylvania state senators during a hearing this week that seemed to command their attention.
Shaw, the embattled railroad company’s chief executive officer, couldn’t say how long his firm has contracted with the Center for Toxicology and Environmental Hazard, a third party that it had hired to perform environmental testing, amid concerns about potential conflicts of interest.
Data demanded under legislative subpoena concerning the Feb. 3 derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, and the controlled burn of five train cars containing hazardous chemicals three days later wasn’t yet available from Norfolk Southern to state senators.
Shaw said he couldn’t say whether there was a transcript of a phone call in which the decision to vent and burn the cars was made and that he wasn’t on the call, either.
As to identifying who led that decision and who was involved in making it, Shaw said he could get a list but that he wasn’t certain. However, he did say that, ultimately, the incident command belonged to East Palestine’s local fire chief on the ground.
“I find it hard to believe the local fire chief would be the one to make the (final) decision to ignite the fire to set off carloads of chemicals,” state Sen. Doug Mastriano, R-Franklin/Adams, said during the committee hearing.
“My understanding is the unified command was aligned on this. It was ultimately the decision of the incident commander, the fire chief, in conjunction with (Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine),” Shaw replied as part of his sworn testimony.
State Sen. Katie Muth, D-Berks/Chester/Montgomery, pressed Shaw about the existence of a flow chart, or something like it, that would simply spell out who’s involved in such an incident and how decisions are made as part of the emergency response.
Shaw said the decision was based solely on the health and safety of East Palestine and beyond, saying the fear was that five train cars could explode and shoot toxic chemicals and shrapnel in all directions across a one-mile radius.
“Who are these people?” Muth asked about the unified command structure.
“Who said, ‘we’re going to do this?' It’s a simple answer, not a hard question,” Mastriano immediately followed.
“Ultimately, the decision falls on the incident commander,” Shaw said.
Mastriano is the chair and Muth is the minority chair for the Senate Veterans Affairs and Emergency Preparedness Committee, which hosted the hearing in the State Capitol.
Shaw told Mastriano he was aware one resident was requested to sign a document for property access for testing, which Mastriano said implied they were waiving legal rights. Shaw called the incident frustrating and said it had “nothing to do with legal rights from the result of this accident.”
“We made it very clear to residents of the community that there are no strings attached,” Shaw said.
Questioned in Harrisburg two weeks after a hearing in Congress, Shaw stressed Norfolk Southern’s resolve to aid East Palestine and surrounding communities. He described $7.8 million in combined financial assistance so far as a “downpayment,” and that funds to provide aid for long-term health impacts, water quality testing and property valuation assurance would be established. He didn’t, however, have an exact answer for approximately how long these supports might be available.
Shaw told Muth under her questioning that he supported certain aspects of the proposed federal Bipartisan Railway Safety Act including enhanced tank car standards, funding for research and design of modernized weigh station detectors. However, he wouldn’t state his position on reducing the length of trains or reduced speed limits in areas with high-density populations — provisions on which Muth sought answers, too. He did stress that the National Transportation Safety Board cleared railway workers of any wrongdoing.
“I think it’s important to note that the vent and burn worked,” Shaw said.
“It worked?” Muth asked.
Shaw pointed to continued environmental testing of air, water and soil in East Palestine and across the state border into Western Pennsylvania that hasn’t shown any signs of contaminants.
Muth pressed Shaw on this point, too, saying if complete real-time data doesn’t exist before, during and after the burn, she’s unsure how anyone can say it was a success.
“It was a success. It worked. I was there on the ground during that. I saw the smoke plume. I know what it looked like but it was the right decision to make and the testing afterward supports that,” Shaw said.
On this point, he had an ally in Republican state Sen. Tracy Pennycuick, who represents parts of Bucks and Montgomery counties.
An Army helicopter pilot who served 26 years, Pennycuick said she conducted controlled burns while in Iraq. Given the risk of an explosion, she said the decision was correct.
“I personally think the fire chief did the right thing with the controlled burn,” Pennycuick said, stressing the potential for an even greater catastrophe.
Dr. Andrew Whelton, a civil and ecological engineering professor at Purdue University, testified to volunteer work he’s led into scrutiny of environmental testing following the derailment.
Whelton criticized the federal Environmental Protection Agency along with state agencies in Ohio and Pennsylvania for limiting its testing to a handful of harmful chemicals, saying it doesn’t encompass all the potential risks.
And, he pointed out, the testing conducted by agencies involved isn’t even standardized, differing from one to the next.
Whelton spoke of adverse health symptoms reported by residents near the derailment site and within a two-mile radius including in Pennsylvania: headaches, nausea, troubled breathing, ear, nose and throat issues. Mastriano said he and others who visited the site experienced the same.
He said the sampling he’s overseen seeks heavy metals, sulfur and more, but that agency testing hasn’t touched on that and other contaminants.
“It’s pretty hard to understand the health risks of something if you’re not testing for it,” Whelton said, adding that it’s unclear who’s guiding the government agencies in conducting the environmental tests.
“The numbers don’t matter,” Whelton said of the volume of contaminants potentially tested for. “It matters what you test for and whether or not it’s cross-cutting. You’re looking at the air, you’re looking at the water and you’re looking at the soil.”
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