It's certainly bad, especially for the locals who still are experiencing a strong chemical smell and continue to report symptoms. There's something still going on there that requires further assessment.
However, for the rest of us, well that would require we sort of implicate every chemical accident, possibly every release of chemicals from plants, or even stuff that we have in our own home. Most modern homes are moving towards PVC piping so you're inherently being exposed to these plasticizers through your own water. Apparently dioxin is produced via cigarette smoking as well. So overall the situation is highly contextual and requires a look broader look. So it certainly doesn't seem like an extinction level event-- I actually find the comparisons to nuclear fallout at Chernobyl and Fukushima to be a pretty bad move by the media since exposure to radioactivity can cause a ton of different harms.
But certainly the harm to the immediate environment should be looked at in particular.
Great description of what is not known and the elements of scientific testing and referencing that are required -- but not available. So is there a strategy to bring late data reflecting dispersements by natural processes -- and veil the early data that reflects on early harms to humans and animals? I hope the lawyers are signing up clients based on the lawyers appropriate sampling of everything in early time by solid experts. Btw -- Mike Addams had comment on the company hired to front safety and toxicology -- maybe not so good for the peeps living in area based on history -- but nothing solid. Bless you for this update and the great questions. The establishment needs to be in court now for speech and press suppression. 💜
I'm not too familiar with assessing the dispersion of the chemicals so I can't really answer that question. Most of the information I report are things that I find, and so I'm learning many of these things at the same time that others are or at the same time that I report on them.
I would assume that dead animals should at least have autopsies conducted to see their manner of death. That would likely explain how they died and give some hints as to the chemicals that likely caused it. For humans clinical assessment and probably blood tests may help, especially for different organic compounds but then that requires they be detected. I'm unaware if instruments are able to conduct such a test (the test for dioxin had to be developed in order to quantify serum dioxin levels).
Note: I wrote the above but then realized I misinterpreted your second question. So is the question asking if the delayed response may be to cover up the initial chemical agents from the giant smoke plume and any immediate harms right at the onset of the fire? In that case, I can't quite speculate on that. There's a balance of figuring out if this is done to hide data or if this just done by people who freaked out and acted impulsively. It could be both-- the railway company freaks out to burn the material in case it leads to an explosion and deaths, but then they may try to obfuscate any actual indications of toxic exposure. I think the fact that there were reports of a chlorine smell (likely due to hydrogen chloride) early on may suggest people who didn't leave immediately before the burn or right when it occurred may have been exposed. Hydrogen chloride is a highly aqueous chemical (does not stay in an anhydrous form if exposed to moisture in air) so even some water would immediately ionize it.
I think the biggest issue is the timing of the fire (when people were not evacuated beforehand), that days went by before tests were done, and then people were allowed to come back given this delay in response. The medical clinic being set up almost 2 and a half weeks after the spill is pretty ridiculous.
Thanks MClark! I'm just reporting on things I find and hopefully more information comes to light.
Thank you for sharing this wealth of information; I'm going to dedicate some time to combing through everything you've collected here over the coming days. I do have one question, or rather, request for information. Do you have access to a map or perhaps a non-visual source of information describing the spread of smoke / airborne chemicals from the fire? (Of course, some compounds are heavier than others, some are lighter, some will travel further than others.) I thought I might find some information on smoke clouds or prevailing winds at the time of the accident from NOAA or a related agency, but nothing came up during a preliminary search. I would greatly appreciate any notes along this line of inquiry from you.
Moving forward, it seems very, very important to provide clear information on exposure risk and safe, accessible remediation or detoxification methods to those affected by the chemical spread - detoxification methods for both human / animal biosystems as well as indoor air, soil, and surface water.
I didn't look at any maps for the dispersion of the plumes so I'm not sure of the exact path. I heard that the smoke was likely heading in the northeast direction towards New York given some models, but in Stephanie Brail's post she mentioned that the path may have been more south/southeast. Again, I haven't looked too deeply into it since that wasn't my focus so I'm not sure:
Detoxification would, unfortunately, be very difficult because we should have to know the actual agent that is causing the harm. That also requires looking at acute and long-term exposure of the agent. That also requires looking at the timeline of the release of chemicals, the burning of the chemicals, the path of the plume, etc. etc.
For instance there's been a focus on vinyl chloride toxicity in the media, but apparently the tanks containing vinyl chloride weren't ruptured- it was the tank carrying butyl acrylate that ruptured and leaked, but media reports continued to focus on this agent in particular. If true that vinyl chloride didn't leak then exposure to this chemical was likely low due to the controlled fire while exposure to butyl acrylate may have been possible as it appeared to have leaked into local waterways.
So that's one possible agent. Then the fire occurred and a whole mess of toxic agents were released including phosgene and hydrogen chloride. At first some reports commented that phosgene was the toxic agent. However, combustion of vinyl chloride only appears to produce a low amount of phosgene relative to hydrogen chloride, which gives off a bleach-like smell which was noted by some of the residents. Hydrogen chloride has harmful acute toxicity, but given that it's an easily ionizable acid any moisture from the environment and any water would immediately ionize it so it's longevity would be very minimal, especially if it began to rain.
Then there's dioxin which has raised concerns over cancer due to allusions to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, but there's uncertainty as to how much dioxin is produced. There's also current pieces of literature which have raised some questions about the direct toxicity of dioxin given that one of its main target receptors, the aryl hydrocarbon receptor, is activated by many different compounds including dioxin. This wasn't known until recent years, so most toxicology studies on dioxin appear to have overlooked this balancing act of AHR. AHR also does different things in different animal models with humans showing more diversity in its use so that also raises issues in translating animal studies into humans.
Right now I'm waiting to see the federal report on East Palestine to skim through it and see if any of the information is helpful, but all this to say that everything is very complex and requires a nuanced approach to figure out what exactly is going on.
I am wondering if the soil removed was where they drained the vinyl chloride tanks to light the chemical on fire? I was stunned to hear that the vinyl chloride tanks were not leaking, that they punctured them to drain into a large hole to set on fire. If this isn't correct, I would like to know!
I'm not sure, but it would appear the butyl acrylate tank was nearly empty. If removed after the fire it was possibly to remove any soil contaminants from the plume that leeched into the soil.
It seems like the vinyl chloride tanks were intact as Pete Lincoln noted based on an EPA document. But there appeared to be chemical fires, and so the concern over an explosion (vinyl chloride is under pressure I believe, and immediate vaporization may lead to a sudden explosion) was possible. The biggest issue is that the action to burn the chemicals leaves the uncertainty of knowing if any explosions would have happened. It would really just come down to hindsight.
Thanks for keeping us posted. Glad that this seems not to be an extinction level event as some other substack articles seem to indicate.
It's certainly bad, especially for the locals who still are experiencing a strong chemical smell and continue to report symptoms. There's something still going on there that requires further assessment.
However, for the rest of us, well that would require we sort of implicate every chemical accident, possibly every release of chemicals from plants, or even stuff that we have in our own home. Most modern homes are moving towards PVC piping so you're inherently being exposed to these plasticizers through your own water. Apparently dioxin is produced via cigarette smoking as well. So overall the situation is highly contextual and requires a look broader look. So it certainly doesn't seem like an extinction level event-- I actually find the comparisons to nuclear fallout at Chernobyl and Fukushima to be a pretty bad move by the media since exposure to radioactivity can cause a ton of different harms.
But certainly the harm to the immediate environment should be looked at in particular.
Great description of what is not known and the elements of scientific testing and referencing that are required -- but not available. So is there a strategy to bring late data reflecting dispersements by natural processes -- and veil the early data that reflects on early harms to humans and animals? I hope the lawyers are signing up clients based on the lawyers appropriate sampling of everything in early time by solid experts. Btw -- Mike Addams had comment on the company hired to front safety and toxicology -- maybe not so good for the peeps living in area based on history -- but nothing solid. Bless you for this update and the great questions. The establishment needs to be in court now for speech and press suppression. 💜
I'm not too familiar with assessing the dispersion of the chemicals so I can't really answer that question. Most of the information I report are things that I find, and so I'm learning many of these things at the same time that others are or at the same time that I report on them.
I would assume that dead animals should at least have autopsies conducted to see their manner of death. That would likely explain how they died and give some hints as to the chemicals that likely caused it. For humans clinical assessment and probably blood tests may help, especially for different organic compounds but then that requires they be detected. I'm unaware if instruments are able to conduct such a test (the test for dioxin had to be developed in order to quantify serum dioxin levels).
Note: I wrote the above but then realized I misinterpreted your second question. So is the question asking if the delayed response may be to cover up the initial chemical agents from the giant smoke plume and any immediate harms right at the onset of the fire? In that case, I can't quite speculate on that. There's a balance of figuring out if this is done to hide data or if this just done by people who freaked out and acted impulsively. It could be both-- the railway company freaks out to burn the material in case it leads to an explosion and deaths, but then they may try to obfuscate any actual indications of toxic exposure. I think the fact that there were reports of a chlorine smell (likely due to hydrogen chloride) early on may suggest people who didn't leave immediately before the burn or right when it occurred may have been exposed. Hydrogen chloride is a highly aqueous chemical (does not stay in an anhydrous form if exposed to moisture in air) so even some water would immediately ionize it.
I think the biggest issue is the timing of the fire (when people were not evacuated beforehand), that days went by before tests were done, and then people were allowed to come back given this delay in response. The medical clinic being set up almost 2 and a half weeks after the spill is pretty ridiculous.
Thanks MClark! I'm just reporting on things I find and hopefully more information comes to light.
Thank you for sharing this wealth of information; I'm going to dedicate some time to combing through everything you've collected here over the coming days. I do have one question, or rather, request for information. Do you have access to a map or perhaps a non-visual source of information describing the spread of smoke / airborne chemicals from the fire? (Of course, some compounds are heavier than others, some are lighter, some will travel further than others.) I thought I might find some information on smoke clouds or prevailing winds at the time of the accident from NOAA or a related agency, but nothing came up during a preliminary search. I would greatly appreciate any notes along this line of inquiry from you.
Moving forward, it seems very, very important to provide clear information on exposure risk and safe, accessible remediation or detoxification methods to those affected by the chemical spread - detoxification methods for both human / animal biosystems as well as indoor air, soil, and surface water.
Sorry for the late reply!
I didn't look at any maps for the dispersion of the plumes so I'm not sure of the exact path. I heard that the smoke was likely heading in the northeast direction towards New York given some models, but in Stephanie Brail's post she mentioned that the path may have been more south/southeast. Again, I haven't looked too deeply into it since that wasn't my focus so I'm not sure:
https://substack.com/inbox/post/101059530
Detoxification would, unfortunately, be very difficult because we should have to know the actual agent that is causing the harm. That also requires looking at acute and long-term exposure of the agent. That also requires looking at the timeline of the release of chemicals, the burning of the chemicals, the path of the plume, etc. etc.
For instance there's been a focus on vinyl chloride toxicity in the media, but apparently the tanks containing vinyl chloride weren't ruptured- it was the tank carrying butyl acrylate that ruptured and leaked, but media reports continued to focus on this agent in particular. If true that vinyl chloride didn't leak then exposure to this chemical was likely low due to the controlled fire while exposure to butyl acrylate may have been possible as it appeared to have leaked into local waterways.
So that's one possible agent. Then the fire occurred and a whole mess of toxic agents were released including phosgene and hydrogen chloride. At first some reports commented that phosgene was the toxic agent. However, combustion of vinyl chloride only appears to produce a low amount of phosgene relative to hydrogen chloride, which gives off a bleach-like smell which was noted by some of the residents. Hydrogen chloride has harmful acute toxicity, but given that it's an easily ionizable acid any moisture from the environment and any water would immediately ionize it so it's longevity would be very minimal, especially if it began to rain.
Then there's dioxin which has raised concerns over cancer due to allusions to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, but there's uncertainty as to how much dioxin is produced. There's also current pieces of literature which have raised some questions about the direct toxicity of dioxin given that one of its main target receptors, the aryl hydrocarbon receptor, is activated by many different compounds including dioxin. This wasn't known until recent years, so most toxicology studies on dioxin appear to have overlooked this balancing act of AHR. AHR also does different things in different animal models with humans showing more diversity in its use so that also raises issues in translating animal studies into humans.
Right now I'm waiting to see the federal report on East Palestine to skim through it and see if any of the information is helpful, but all this to say that everything is very complex and requires a nuanced approach to figure out what exactly is going on.
I am wondering if the soil removed was where they drained the vinyl chloride tanks to light the chemical on fire? I was stunned to hear that the vinyl chloride tanks were not leaking, that they punctured them to drain into a large hole to set on fire. If this isn't correct, I would like to know!
I'm not sure, but it would appear the butyl acrylate tank was nearly empty. If removed after the fire it was possibly to remove any soil contaminants from the plume that leeched into the soil.
It seems like the vinyl chloride tanks were intact as Pete Lincoln noted based on an EPA document. But there appeared to be chemical fires, and so the concern over an explosion (vinyl chloride is under pressure I believe, and immediate vaporization may lead to a sudden explosion) was possible. The biggest issue is that the action to burn the chemicals leaves the uncertainty of knowing if any explosions would have happened. It would really just come down to hindsight.