What would you do if you lived an hour away from New Palestine, OH? What would you do if you lived closer?

I'd imagine everyone has been reading about this latest disaster. This is the sort of thing that could happen to any of us. There is an alarming discrepancy between official statements and anecdotal stories from people in the area who are reporting health problems and pet or livestock deaths. It must be hard to know what to do.

A good question. While I have developed some basic plans (return home / don't return home) or (stay at home / leave home) I don't know how feasible is would be to create a complete playbook. Basically, my plan is to learn what I can and make the best decisions I can.

It's often better to have plans made in advance, when things are calm and one's executive functioning isn't degraded by the situation.

I think of myself as reasonably knowledgeable about how rail issues might affect my community but I clearly don't know enough to decide everything in advance.

I think the take away from this is that rail issues can affect you even if you are not close to any rail. From what I've read/heard the radius of this is quite large.

There is no easy answer. If the condition is so bad that you have to move, you will not be able to sell your property. For most people, that would mean they could not buy a place elsewhere, or if they did, the home they purchased would be nothing compared to what they left behind.

In this situation, renters would be better off.

Jeanette Isabelle

The decision to do a controlled burn seems nuts.

Reminded of the dead whale carcass on a beach, and they tried blow it up with 1/2 ton of dynamite.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6CLumsir34

Similar happened to residents of NOLA when hurricane Katrina hit, many had to bug out ahead of the storm and had nothing to return too.

I would imagine most homeowners policies would cover something, but a lot will pay to rebuild the house as is so you would still have to sell it if you didn't couldn't go back, or bad companies like Allstate who don't honor their contracts.

Before we get to worrying about property value, it seems like there is no reliable information on safety, especially in the long term. Expert advice isn't reassuring. Take this report from NPR, for example:

https://www.npr.org/2023/02/14/1156567743/health-east-palestine-ohio-train-derailment-chemicals



So your house may be contaminated with a dangerous carcinogenic chemical, and all you have to do is... wipe down surfaces & vacuum carefully?

This sort of situation -- not having enough information -- is common in emergencies. Sometimes your life may be at stake. What's your strategy? Just roll the dice? Follow the plan that you made? Trust your gut?

Yeah, this one doesn't pass the sniff test. I think it's going to end being a pretty epic furball.

With regard to individual planning and actions and not what anyone else does: Life safety first, above all else.

If I can preserve my ability to make a living and save expensive or important equipment and goods as well, so much the better.

If my real estate were irreparably contaminated, that’s what insurance and lawyers are for.

This reminds me of then EPA Administrator’s Statement ( who was a respected former female R. Gov. Of NJ) , immediately post 911, that the air quality in Lower Manhattan was safe and their was no risk from the rumble pollutants. NOT!

Unfortunately such knee jerk Gov’t.” Advisories” are all too common, treating the public like litttle children who have to be “ protected from the truth” , to avoid panic and/ or blame. The public should castigate and “shun” from public life, any bureaucrat or elected official who gets caught giving such untrue statements., without regard to their long tenure, generally likeability, former trustworthiness or their political affiliation. The equivalent of a political ”death sentence”. If this happened a few times, we might get a more honest and responsive government.

I have some substantial general knowledge about how large freight railroads operate. Truth is, especially in regard to the mile or two long transcontinental trains, the Railroad generally has no knowledge of nor is their regulation of what goes into the freight mix. Their are placard regulations for various chemicals , commodities and explaosives. Amend some slightly more extensive regulation of certain freight , post 911. But not much.

There is also no national emergency response organization, which is flown or otherwise quickly transported to crash sites to contain chemical leaks, douse highly polluting fires, deal with explosives and/ or radioactive leakage. All events which grossly overwhelm the response capabilities of the many tiny, mostly volunteer, rural and suburban fire departments , which these trains transit.

Railroads , as most recently reported in the NYT and other media, are largely self-regulated. In my experience , most management operates as if it were the 1890s and fight all safety/ pollution regulations, usually successfully, due to wide and well funded lawyers and lobbyists. In return for this relative freedom from Gov’t. Regulation, Railroads get much less Gov’t.subsidy, than the trucking or airline indusry. Railroads own and pay for their mode of transit. ( the rails and right of ways themselves) and terminal facilities. Airlines fly in air lanes closely regulated and financed by the states and Federal Gov’r. ( Air traffic control is based Nationwide) Air line terminals and adjacent trucking facilities are often publicly financed. Gov’t does rescue and much clean-up, in the event of a crash, etc. Trucking operates upon publicly funded & maintained interstate ( National Defense) intercontinental highway systems, first funded a under President Eisenhower. That’s why the USA is a surburban car/ truck civilization and not city based, joined by modern train/ trolley systems , as in Europe and almost everywhere else.