Quick Take
The derailment of a freight train carrying toxic chemicals in eastern Ohio
has sparked a slew of unfounded claims by conservative commentators.
ThereAs no indication that this incident will rise to the level of a
odomestic Chernobylo; it has been covered steadily by the media; federal
and state agencies are monitoring air and water quality and its impact on people and animals.

Full Story
The Feb. 3 freight train derailment near the village of East Palestine,
Ohio u population 5,000 u has continued to draw media and public
attention.

The 150-car train was transporting 20 cars that contained hazardous
substances when 38 cars derailed about 50 miles northwest of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, apparently due to a mechanical issue with one of the trainAs axles.

Days after the crash, officials burned off chemicals carried by the train
in an effort to avoid a potential explosion. That fire created a billow of dark smoke over the village, and pictures of it spread on social media.

Those images, paired with concern about the environmental and health
impacts from the incident, have fueled a rash of alarming claims.

While concerns about public health and safety are valid, some commentators
and social media accounts have ratcheted up unfounded rhetoric about the situation.

For example, conservative commentator Charlie Kirk compared the incident
to the 1986 explosion of a Soviet nuclear reactor, telling his 2.6 million Facebook followers, oIt could very well be a domestic Chernobyl.o

Conspiracy theorist Alex JonesA outlet, InfoWars, has also amplified fears about the incident and repeated the common falsehood that there has been a lack of news coverage. oMainstream media is hardly covering this,o said commentator Harrison Smith.

And Fox News host Tucker Carlson said on the Feb. 15 episode of his show,
oIs anyone in charge actually monitoring with any accuracy the level of
deadly chemicals in the air, ground, and water in and around East
Palestine? Well, no, apparently nobody is.o

ThereAs no basis for any of those claims.

To start with, there was no nuclear material on the train and the
aftermath of the incident is far from the scale of Chernobyl, which
required the permanent relocation of about 200,000 people and left 30
people dead in the first three months following the explosion in the
spring of 1986. No deaths have been reported from the train derailment.

Second, news coverage of the train crash and its aftermath has been steady
in both local and national outlets. The Associated Press, NPR and CNN, for example, each published an article on the crash the day after it happened. Coverage continued throughout the following week and picked up even more
in the second week after the crash, according to a search on Lexis Nexis,
as claims on social media spiraled.

Third, contrary to CarlsonAs suggestion that thereAs been little to no
testing done, both state and federal environmental officials have been on site, testing both air and water quality.

HereAs what we know so far about the situation concerning some of the most viral claims.

Toxic Chemicals
Of the 38 train cars that derailed, 11 were carrying hazardous substances, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.

The most prominent chemical on board was vinyl chloride, a gas used to manufacture polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, which is used to make plastic
pipes, credit cards and shrink-wrap, among other products.

According to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry,
breathing in high amounts of vinyl chloride can make people dizzy or
sleepy, and extended exposure to the chemical is associated with certain cancers, particularly a rare form of liver cancer. Most people are not
exposed to much vinyl chloride unless they work with the chemical.

Vinyl chloride is highly flammable, which led the governors of Ohio and Pennsylvania to decide to intentionally release it from the five train
cars ferrying the material and burn it in a controlled fashion, rather
than risk an explosion. Burning the gas, however, produces other
potentially harmful gases, including hydrogen chloride, carbon monoxide
and traces of phosgene.

Phosgene has garnered a lot of attention because the chemical was used as
a weapon during World War I. But that involved high concentrations of the
gas, which can damage the lungs. At lower concentrations, phosgene smells
like freshly cut hay and can irritate the eyes and throat and cause
wheezing and coughing.

The Environmental Protection Agency has said the othreato of phosgene and hydrogen chloride ceased after the fire was put out on Feb. 8, and the
agency stopped monitoring for the two gases on Feb. 13.

Other chemicals on the train that were released into the environment
include butyl acrylate, ethylhexyl acrylate and ethylene glycol monobutyl ether, according to the EPA. All of these substances are used in making paints, among other products, and can cause irritation and drowsiness or
other symptoms if inhaled, touched or ingested.

Another train car was transporting isobutylene, a flammable chemical
sometimes used to make aviation fuel, but records indicate the car was not breached.

It remains unclear what the health and environmental impacts of the
spilled and burned chemicals will be. However, the EPA has been testing
the air and water since Feb. 4, and currently, there are no indications
that the air or the villageAs municipal drinking water is unsafe.

As of Feb. 19, the EPA is continuing its air monitoring and has tested air samples from 533 homes, finding no cases in which chemicals have exceeded residential air quality standards.

The agency has noted that butyl acrylate, which has a strong fruity odor,
has a low odor threshold, as do other chemicals produced in the controlled burn. oThis means people may smell these contaminants at levels much lower than what is considered hazardous,o the EPA explained on its update page
for the derailment.

On Feb. 15, the Ohio EPA declared the municipal water osafe to drink,o
after tests revealed no detections of ocontaminants associated with the derailmento in either treated water or untreated water from the five wells that feed into the villageAs water system.

State authorities, however, have said that people who get their water from private wells should use bottled water until their wells can be tested. As
of Feb. 19, 52 wells have been tested, and none shows owater quality concerns,o according to federal officials.

Outside scientists say the monitoring results are good, but that testing
needs to continue and expand to cover more substances. There are also important questions about how the chemicals will react in the environment
and what the health effects might be.

Juliane Beier, a researcher at the University of Pittsburgh who studies
vinyl chloride, has explained that even levels of exposure that are
considered safe may pose risks over time.

oWe study concentrations that are currently considered safe, and in our studies, what we have observed is that these low doses can enhance
underlying diseases u talking about liver diseases here,o she told
Scientific American of her experiments with vinyl chloride in animals.

Beier said the biggest concern with vinyl chloride is that it could escape into the air from untested well water.

oThe outdoor air is a little less problematic because vinyl chloride gets dispersed very quickly and broken down by the sunlight, within a few days, itAs a similar situation in the soil or open body of water. However, one
of the things I always emphasize if it goes into the ground water and transported to homes and private wells, it is highly volatile, so it can suffuse into air within those closed spaces,o she told a local news
station in Pittsburgh. oIt comes out of the water, into the air and thatAs really the major route of toxicity for the liver. It comes through the
air.o

To address the medical concerns of area residents, some of whom have
reported developing rashes, headaches and other symptoms, the Ohio
Department of Health opened a ohealth assessment clinico on Feb. 21.

Reasoning for the Burn
By Feb. 5 u two days after the crash u the potential for an explosion had developed because pressure-relief valves stopped working on some train
cars that were carrying vinyl chloride.

oThe concern was that this would be catastrophic,o Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine
said at a Feb. 14 press conference, explaining that the resulting shrapnel
was expected to travel up to a mile.

Norfolk Southern, the rail company that was operating the train, proposed conducting a ocontrolled releaseo of the vinyl chloride into prepared pits before being burned off.

The Ohio National Guard together with the Department of Defense modeled
the likely effect of the release plan, and, based on that, DeWine and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro ordered an evacuation of the area so that
rail workers could begin the process.

oWe were faced with two bad options,o DeWine said at the press conference. oOne option was to do nothing and wait for the car to explode,o he said,
and the other was to release the chemical and burn it.

Officials authorized the burn option and rail workers began the
ocontrolled releaseo of five train cars carrying vinyl chloride on Feb. 6.

Dead Animals
About 3,500 fish and aquatic species died in four creeks and small
waterways near East Palestine in the days after the crash, Mary Mertz, director of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, said at the Feb. 14 press conference.

Wildlife officers have been working with contractors who are taking
samples from the waterways, she said, explaining that they havenAt seen an increase in the number of fish killed since the first couple of days after
the derailment.

Officials believe most of the deaths u which occurred primarily in small suckers, minnows, darters and sculpins u were caused by the immediate
release of contaminants into the water before mitigation efforts had begun after the crash, according to a release from the Ohio Emergency Management Agency.

oWe donAt have any evidence of non-aquatic species suffering from the derailment,o Mertz said at the press conference.

But some residents of the surrounding area have suggested that pets or livestock have been affected by the chemicals released in the crash.

oTo this date, there is nothing weAve seen in the livestock community that causes any concerns to the state,o Dr. Dennis Summers, chief of the Ohio Department of AgricultureAs Division of Animal Health, said at the press conference.

He explained that anyone who is concerned that pets or livestock have died
as a result of the chemicals released in the crash should contact their veterinarian, who can send samples to the state lab for testing.

So far, the lab has received tissue samples from one animal u a 6-week-old beef calf that died on Feb. 11 about 2 miles from East Palestine.

Bryan Levin, spokesman for the Ohio Department of Agriculture, confirmed
to FactCheck.org in an email that this has been the only animal tissue submitted so far and that the results are still pending.

Train Crashes
The crash near East Palestine has highlighted regulatory and safety issues
for the rail industry, with some industry watchers and labor
representatives pointing to increasing train lengths and changes to
braking regulations as factors contributing to potential safety problems.

Some social media posts, though, have gone much further, claiming that
thereAs been a osuspiciouso increase in train crashes recently.

But for the last three years u 2022, 2021 and 2020 u there have been about 9,000 train accidents annually, which includes any collision, derailment
or fire, according to data from the Federal Railroad Administration. That number is down from an average of nearly 12,000 accidents per year from
2013 to 2019.

The decline in the number of train derailments, however, has been less pronounced. There were 1,049 in 2022, compared with 1,311 in 2013.

And, getting even more specific, the number of derailed or damaged train
cars carrying hazardous materials u like the 11 hazmat cars that derailed
near East Palestine u has been below 1,000 every year for the last decade. There were 520 such cars that derailed in 2022.

We donAt know how many crashes or derailments there have been so far in
2023; an FRA spokesman told us that data wonAt be available until March.
But the widely circulating suggestion that thereAs been a stark increase recently isnAt supported by evidence, and the most recent data show that thereAs been a decrease in accidents overall in recent years.

Clarification, Feb. 22: We changed our characterization of the smaller
decline in train derailments, as compared with the decrease in total train accidents.

EditorAs note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous
stories can be found here. Facebook has no control over our editorial
content.

Sources
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National Transportation Safety Board. oNTSB Media Brief: Norfolk Southern Freight Train Derailment (02/04/23).o YouTube. 4 Feb 2023.

National Transportation Safety Board. oNTSB Media Brief 2: Norfolk
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International Atomic Energy Agency. Frequently Asked Chernobyl Questions. Accessed 20 Feb 2023.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Train cargo list. Accessed 17 Feb
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Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. East Palestine Train Derailment Information. Accessed 17 Feb 2023.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. East Palestine Train Derailment.
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Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. Vinyl Chloride -ToxFAQs.
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American Chemistry Council. Polyvinyl Chloride. Chemicalsafetyfacts.org. Updated 14 Oct 2022.

National Cancer Institute. Vinyl Chloride. Updated 23 Nov 2022.

Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. Medical Management Guidelines for Vinyl Chloride. Updated 21 Oct 2014.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Facts About Phosgene. Updated
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The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Butyl acrylate. Updated 30 Oct 2019.

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Goodman, Brenda and Caroll Alvarado. oEast Palestine residents worry
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DeWine, Mike. Press release. oEast Palestine Update: Evacuation Area
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<https://www.factcheck.org/2023/02/commentators-push-unfounded-claims- about-ohio-train-derailment/>
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