Train derailment in Ohio produced the chemical poisoning of a town
This guest blog is part of a series intended as a dedicated space for the many global movements/campaigns around the globe confronting ecosystem destruction to share their stories, narratives and perspectives.
By: Steven Donziger
This guest blog was written by human rights lawyer, Steven Donziger, best known for his legal battles with Chevron, particularly Aguinda v. Texaco, Inc. and other cases in which he represented over 30,000 farmers and indigenous people who suffered environmental damage and health problems caused by oil drilling in the Lago Agrio oil field of Ecuador.
A disastrous derailment of a train carrying highly toxic and cancer-causing chemicals in the US state of Ohio appears to have produced a mass poisoning of the small town of East Palestine. Thousands of people now face the risk of cancer and premature death because of a clear case of corporate malfeasance. The incident illustrates again why Ecocide must be enshrined as international law. I would argue that if Ecocide had been law, this incident and the calamitous ecological and humanitarian crisis that resulted might have been avoided.
Ecocide is defined as “unlawful or wanton acts committed with knowledge that there is a substantial likelihood of severe and either widespread or long-term damage to the environment.” The evidence from this incident of corporate misconduct and “wanton acts” by the responsible party with long-term environmental damage is overwhelming.
The railway company whose train caused the accident – Norfolk Southern – had a market value of roughly $55 billion with its top management team making exorbitant salaries. The company recently spent billions of dollars on a stock buy-back that enriched shareholders while refusing to invest to upgrade the antiquated braking systems on its trains, which date back more than a century. The company also spent massively to lobby both the federal and various state governments to prevent regulations from being implemented that would have modernized the braking systems and increased safety.
Norfolk Southern and its CEO Alan Shaw are central players in an industry that is notorious for exploiting its workers. The train that derailed in Ohio had 150 cars and was 1.7 miles long, but only had two exhausted workers manning the controls. The industry had not given its workers a raise in three years. Profit margins in the industry in the last decade have risen from 15% to 41% as railway workers (and safety risks) reached a breaking point. Some of the largest hedge funds in the United States – including Blackstone – demanded greater and greater efficiencies to increase their profits.
When the derailment happened, Norfolk Southern made a misguided decision to detonate more than 1 million pounds of highly flammable vinyl chloride. It did this without any community input or discussion of health risks. As one local engineer put it, the railway essentially “nuked” the town to get the rails open sooner in order to keep profits flowing. The result was a giant mushroom cloud of poison floating over the town and hundreds of miles beyond. The fireball produced additional chemical compounds – including phosgene, a chemical compound so deadly it was banned by the Geneva Convention after World War I.
Thousands of fish were floating dead in local streams. Residents reported respiratory ailments. Yet local “authorities” claims it was safe to live there and drink the water. We went through this same playbook after the attacks on 9/11, and hundreds of people in the affected area ended up dying of cancer.
The US government – including the Environmental Protection Agency – has been hapless. The EPA was neutered under the Trump Administration with top administrators being replaced by chemical industry lobbyists. Its top official under the Biden Administration, Michael Regan, recommended that residents of East Palestine return to the town just days after the accident even though the agency had not done any independent lab testing of the water.
Regan still seems more focused on helping Norfolk Southern manage the public relations fallout than on his mission to protect the public from environmental harm. Journalist Chris D’Angelo in an excellent article demonstrates the testing relied on by the Ohio "authorities" and the EPA to declare the water “safe” in East Palestine was funded by the railway company and that the samples tested were tainted. In my opinion, this is scientific and political malpractice and an example of corporate capture of a critical public function of our government.
As for the safety of the water, Norfolk only tested in five spots in the town of East Palestine which is suspicious. There should be hundreds of samples taken on a daily basis, not just in East Palestine but in surrounding communities also impacted by the poison mushroom cloud. And the tests must be for all the chemicals burned off, including the new compounds created by the detonation. One independent expert called the sampling "sloppy" and "amateur". Further, neither the Ohio EPA nor the national EPA have published any water sampling results from East Palestine for several days, suggesting there is no ongoing water monitoring.
This is all deeply disturbing. There are a lot of tough questions that need answers. But the facts thus far strongly suggest that the rail company made a series of intentional decisions motivated by profit that produced this disaster and worsened the aftermath for the public, leading to a substantial likelihood of long-term environmental harm and likely death. This is precisely the kind of situation where ecocide law could have made a concrete difference. Had the CEO been confronted with this law, there is a good chance the braking system would have been upgraded and the accident would not have occurred.