Two More Trains Derail Across US After Ohio Catastrophe
February 14, 2023 in News by RBN Staff
source: zerohedge
About ten days after a train carrying vinyl chloride derailed and exploded, releasing dangerous chemicals into the air and water near the Ohio-Pennsylvania border, two more trains derailed on Monday alone.
Early Monday morning in East Texas, an 18-wheeler collided with a train. The truck was dragged half a mile down the tracks. The ‘accident’ derailed 21 cars operated by Union Pacific.
When first responders arrived at the scene, the truck driver was dead, according to Splendora Police Department. The police department said the train was carrying hazardous materials though the crash didn’t rupture any tanks.
Then later in the day in Enoree, South Carolina, another train derailed.
The derailments come ten days after a 150-car Norfolk Southern freight train derailed in the town of East Palestine. Of the cars, 20 carried hazardous materials that caused a massive fire and released toxic chemicals.
Newsweek noted a startling trend of more than a dozen reported rail wrecks across the US since the year started.
“The Palestine wreck is the tip of the iceberg and a red flag,” Ron Kaminkow, an Amtrak locomotive engineer and former Norfolk Southern freight engineer, told The Guardian. He’s also the secretary for the Railroad Workers United, a non-profit labor group that coordinates with the nation’s rail unions.
The series of derailments is a wake-up call about the nation’s rail workforce having dwindled as railroads focus on profits rather than safety, Kaminkow noted.
He warned: “If something is not done, then it’s going to get worse, and the next derailment could be cataclysmic.”
And by the way, one estimate shows about 25 million Americans live in an oil train blast zone.
Also, why did it take Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg ten days to finally comment on the disaster in East Palestine?