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AJ_De_Leon t1_jcmbxvx wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in Levels of carcinogenic chemical near Ohio derailment site far above safe limit by Additional-Force-795

Is there a danger for people over 200 miles outside East Palestine? I’m concerned the contaminated livestock/crops will still be sold to food markets near and far

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Ok_Improvement_5897 t1_jcms7o5 wrote

As someone in Easternish PA who's been out of the country for this whole mess and about to return in a couple weeks.....seconded lol. Could it have contaminated the local waterways?

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DonsDiaperChanger t1_jcmy0im wrote

if it did... they don't want you to know. You might sue, that threatens their profits, just like paying for cleanup is bad for profits.

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Odie_Odie t1_jcox949 wrote

I think this is in the Ohio River watershed and you should be fine in E PA.

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Ok_Improvement_5897 t1_jcp03by wrote

Thankyou - sympathies to the people who are not....fucking awful. Hate that our regions have become an absolute toxic heap because of incidents like this over the years - as if PA and OH don't already have some of the highest incidences of cancer.

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Scribe625 t1_jcpu3d5 wrote

I'm in Western PA and the news here has said they've been doing tests to make sure everything is safe and the local governments are trying to make sure areas in Western PA that were close but not in the evacuation zone aren't forgotten by Norfolk Southern.

I know people with farms in Beaver County, PA have been concerned about whether their crops, livestock, or water could be contaminated but no one so far has found anything but the air being contaminated during the idiotic controlled burn. I'm hoping that because our part of the Ohio River is upstream from the derailment the contamination won't spread to the many rivers in the Pittsburgh area, but I'd hope they're being tested regularly since I know some of the Pittsburgh universities like Carnegie Mellon were involved in independent testing in East Palestine.

However, the person I knew who tested the local waterways and raised concerns about what had gone into the Allegheny River when a Norfolk Southern train with hazardous material derailed into the river in 2005 isn't here anymore so I can't find out the real water results this time and know from the 2005 crash not to blindly accept the publicly reported results, so it's kind of anyone's guess right now if it's really safe with the first day of trout starting March 25th for youth and April 1st for everyone else. I'll be erring on the side of caution and skipping fishing this year unless I find someone local who has independently verified the local water and the fish in it aren't contaminated.

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femtoinfluencer t1_jcpw5c7 wrote

> no one so far has found anything but the air being contaminated during the idiotic controlled burn.

Dioxin and many of the other combustion products are solids, and will have settled out of the plume and into the soil based on prevailing winds.

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Ok_Improvement_5897 t1_jcpxi0o wrote

Thanks for the input - and yeah, good idea on skipping trout season. And yeah history has proven time and time again in this state that every environmental disaster is so much worse than what they initially publicly report - sick of it. Stay safe.

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losterweil t1_jcnunuu wrote

I would think directly downstream would be affected for a while. I live 75 miles as the crow flies upstream. Everyone is eerily quiet about it here.

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vahntitrio t1_jcnwp3q wrote

Probably not. 1/r² principal probably applies. So levels will drop off very quickly with increasing distance. I couldn't find the distance they measured high levels at, but if they are only at ground zero the contamination is unlikely to spread more than a mile at harmful levels.

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Gorgoth24 t1_jcot10z wrote

Inverse square doesn't work well for most ground contaminants. Rainfall tends to collect the contaminant back into streams and rivers then transport it downstream where concentration is based on different math. Initial concentration * e ^ (-1 * constant * time) where the constant varies per material is how it's typically simplified for point discharge. There are a variety of factors in a material that was concentrated, released in various forms, re-concentrated as runoff, then transported downstream as it settles.

My understanding is that decent modeling software exists but it takes time and money to get decent environmental engineers to do an analysis.

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losterweil t1_jcqgkvw wrote

After contributing to this thread I went on a little research project… what I concluded is lawyers are only collecting people from a 30 mile radius. That’s about it. There is diddly squat besides that.

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Gorgoth24 t1_jcqhz16 wrote

Expected profitability for a lawsuit probably follows inverse square math

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losterweil t1_jcstesw wrote

You’re on the scent. I also have read a source(I don’t remember) which said contaminates most likely blew over 200 hundred miles.

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iBlag t1_jcofx0o wrote

The 1/r^2 probably doesn’t apply due to many assumptions that don’t hold in this case.

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