Wildlife VP: East Palestine mustn't join 'inexcusable list.' Biden, DeWine must investigate by: Mustafa Santiago Ali:
We also need the Biden Administration to get to the bottom of why this accident occurred where it did and the way it did.
The National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Railroad Administration should conduct a thorough investigation into how our existing infrastructure and recent regulatory changes may have contributed to this disaster. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration also rolled back regulations limiting the vapor pressure restrictions on petroleum byproducts transported by rail. We don’t yet know the impact of these changes on what happened in East Palestine, Ohio, but we need to get to the bottom of whether they contributed to the disaster.
The uncertainty hanging over eastern Ohio is as clear as the plumes of smoke wafting over East Palestine.
The people of Ohio need the Biden and DeWine administrations to get to the bottom of what happened and to transparently share the short- and long-term risks facing people and wildlife alike. We know, for example, that the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and the Federal Railroad Administration worked during the Trump administration to relax standards for electronically controlled pneumatic brake systems on trains carrying hazardous and flammable materials. Our nation has far too many sacrifice zones — communities treated like environmental and health externalities. East Palestine should not be the latest to join that inexcusable list.
17 E. J. TODAY
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