The effected citizens need to file a massive lawsuit against NS for negligence. That derailment could have absolutely been prevented with proper safety inspections. This is a direct result of not having enough people to do the jobs safely.
It’s not just NS it is literally the entire US freight rail network. To briefly explain railroads used to be over-managed then the government realized they messed up then they removed like 99% of the regulations and then railroads just got worse and worse every declare since the 80s.
The $10K fine is trivial compared to the cost of cleanup and repairs to the damaged rails and rail cars. It signifies the regulator thinks NS did a good but not quite perfect cleanup job. Ultimately, we are the ones who pay for it all. The cost just gets marked up and passed on by every layer between NS and the end consumer who ultimately pays. Let's say it cost NS $500K, which after several layers of markup, is a few million dollars by the time it gets to a few hundred million consumers who each pay a few cents each for this derailment.
How about stating the cause as: Inexperienced crew due to very low retention rates of employees who are supervised by managers that have drank the Koolaid and do no have the ability to think and further hampered by a country that cannot supply enough job seekers that can pass a drug test
Or insufficient pay to make a job with uncomfortable working conditions desirable (leading to high turn over), and executives and managers who lack the autonomy to do anything other than unquestioningly follow dictates from fund managers (i.e. activist shareholders) who know nothing about railway operations.
I see the derailment that occurred on October 8th 2022 in Sandusky Ohio has had a few positive developments since the derailment and horrible after effects in Palestine, Ohio. An overpass bridge destroyed in the Sandusky, Ohio derailment has now been totally repaired including the road fixed that went under the overpass bridge. Sandusky has been trying to get this done since October 2022 with no help forthcoming despite many pleas for help with the cost of the repairs to Norfolk Southern. I guess all the negative publicity Norfolk Southern is getting from the East Palestine accident has helped Sandusky, Ohio.
NS seems to have derailments quite often, it doesn't seem like they take repairs and preventative maintenance into consideration very much. Please let me know if I'm wrong. Great coverage though, I'm hooked on your videos and I just subscribed!
For years they was the recipient of the Harriman safety award but I'm not sure if it's still around. Back around early to mid 2000's CSX was the one having all the derailment.
Thanks for following and updated cause of accident. East Palestine glad see President of NS show up make a presence but article says lawyer said not take money 💸 from NS .
Great video! Very clear monologue and superb video production value. I’m sure I would not learn as much from a 4:13 minute broadcast done by a professional news outlet. Very polished production.
Thank you for your excellent reporting and quality informative videos. NS has a history of not properly cleaning up the destruction they created. I live in Portage County about ten minutes away from the NS derailment that happened 11/4. That incident still has not been cleared away. There is still bridge damage and road closure in Sandusky from a derailment in October After damaging infrastructure in Pittsburgh they never completed repairs. I believe the Pittsburgh Port Authority sent them an invoice for nearly 4 million. The fines and penalties need to be more severe.
Pittsburgher here, can confirm. Nearly 5 years after the derailment here NS is *still* trying to avoid footing the bill for the damage they did to Port Authority’s light rail tracks. Taxpayers have had to foot the bill for NS’s ineptitude.
Nice and informative video Charlie. I live just how in depth you go with your information and your narration. Keep it up buddy. Hope to see you in Athens!
It's always tricky to judge the cleanup decisions. I would assume that vac trucks were used to suck up the bulk material and some small percentage was left behind in the mud or it had already floated away. The guys in charge of the cleanup may have decided to stop rather than do more harm by digging up miles of creek. I've been in those situations and typically the company coordinates and communicates with the regulators. A $10K fine is like getting and "A" on your clean up but you failed to get and "A+" BTW - I worked a derailment in TX back in the 80's. A boxcar caught fire and set other cars on fire. The mess was scattered out for 10 miles - it was US mail and it was all junk mail - millions of junk mail items. I'll bet half burned, 10% blew away and 40% got picked up by the Santa Fe crew of Navajo Indians that did the clean up - what mess when it all goes wrong.
NS could have saved 10G if they would have cleaned it up quicker and used mitigation measures to prevent soybeans from getting to the water source. Love your style!
Accidents happen, sure.. But i think these multi-billion dollar rail corps need to maintain their right of way and equipment much better. It seems like little reinvestment into infrastructure is an after thought if they can get their shareholders a few extra cents. 'penny smart pound foolish'
I don't seem to remember this many derailments 15-20 years ago? Think maybe a full audit of what regulations and policies have been revised or neglected and get things back to the way they were.
You are right. The fines aren’t near hi enough. As with all major rail carriers if the initial fines are really costly for non compliance, the clean up and the rumination will start asap. A $10,000 fine is like a dollar bill to a major carrier. They will make any excuse to delay the cost of cleanup.
Huge Greed and Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR) are the two (2) Biggest Factors in an Obvious Uptick in Train Derailments by Class I Railroads. 🤪👎
I wish the States that NS runs uncovered coal trains through would take NS to court somehow. They pollute countless little towns with coal dust trains, and also their former hometown Norfolk for decades. This long term coal dust pollution comes from the antiquated uncovered rotary dumpers that load coal onto ships. It's not like residents haven't protested time and time again.
And yet you never hear the EPD going after the city of Atlanta for discharging thousands of gallons of raw sewage into the hooch yet every night about 2 or 3 AM the overflow alarm sounds at their water treatment facility and moments later there's sludge and bits of toilet paper going right down towards Camp Creek Pkwy and onward to the Gulf.
Damn. Gainesville is my hometown. Wish I would have known all this. For one, Flat Creek has always been a polluted creek and absolutely nothing unusual for fish to die and D.O. Levels to be very low. The Riverkeeper group is mainly an environmental whacko group. Secondly, I would have cleaned up those soybeans for my deer and chickens to eat for free.
The NS executives spend $10k on dinner. Need to add a few more zeros to that fine. Truly disgusting. There needs to be more accountability with these railroad 'accidents'.
What I wonder about is how the amount of soybeans necc to alter oxygen levels got into a creek that is so far from the derailment location. I went to the location right after this happened and thrte were big vacuum trucks sucking up tje soybeans. I even grabbed a small sample of the soybeans for some reason. Flat Creek is like half mile sway at lesst. Maybe rain runoff moved soybeans to creek? If anyone knows how please let me know.
$10K fine should be PER DAY til the area is restored 100% at NSC's expense. How many other companies PAY for studies on how to "save" the cost of 1 worker per train and how to reduce the cost of safety inspections. I work in logistics optimization & know that all factors must be considered, even if human suffering is ignored. BTW, $100M won't be enough for East Palestine.
These companies could care less look at the oil company out in Alaska they didn't care they'll just write the check these long trains are wrong you have to pay to play safety is a choice not a mistake shame on them I get the railroad my dad worked for them it brings product from point a to point b well done
Well, the size of a fine isn't dictated by the net worth of the offender, so rather than compare the $10k to NSC's revenue, consider that it's for killing DOZENS of fish. That's some pretty expensive fish.
Here's an unpopular idea. Let's slow freight trains to 50 mph. That way when a derailment happens, it won't be so severe as the Ohio crash was. That way bearings don't get quite so hot under a loaded car, and is subject to a catastrophic failure and major derailment. From a safety standpoint, there's no reason for a 2.5 mile long train to run that fast. And if we look at this from a physics perspective, trains that long create their own wind tunnel if you will, and not much air gets to the bearings to be able to cool themselves off under loaded weight. Just an idea, and I'm sure it will be very unpopular.
Trains through EP already run at 50 MPH. Slowing them down to that speed wouldn’t do much. It would make more sense for the railroads to, I don’t know, maintain their infrastructure/rolling stock and stop cutting corners.
I'm not disputing the fine, but the EPD says the oxygen levels were harmed by the soybeans. How do they know the soybeans did that? Maybe the levels were low when the accicent occurred? Just wondering.
