Documents suggest officials downplayed East Palestine train derailment, prompting probe request

Trump administration officials are calling for a federal watchdog investigation into the response to the 2023 East Palestine, Ohio, train derailment, citing newly disclosed documents showing internal models predicted thousands of severe casualties from an unnecessary procedure. In a joint letter to the Environmental Protection Agency’s internal watchdog, Vice President J.D. Vance and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin requested that the Office of Inspector General probe the Biden-Harris administration’s response to the massive toxic chemical spill and fire. In February 2023, a Norfolk Southern freight train derailed in East Palestine, causing a hazardous material release, some of which subsequently made its way into the Ohio River. Almost eight months after the incident, former President Joseph R. Biden signed an executive order designating the Federal Emergency Management Agency as the disaster recovery coordinator to oversee long-term recovery efforts. The Biden administration deployed federal emergency and environmental teams, ordering railway company Norfolk Southern to lead the cleanup and later issuing executive orders to hold the company accountable. The National Transportation Safety Board determined in 2024 that a high-risk, last-resort procedure was ultimately unnecessary. A vent-and-burn procedure — an emergency technique used to safely empty a damaged, pressurized tank car, truck or storage vessel containing flammable gas — should be a last resort, used when a tank car is about to fail. Investigators learned that Norfolk Southern rejected three other removal methods and began planning for a vent and burn shortly after the derailment. The chemical temperatures were stabilizing, and the decision to proceed was based on incomplete and misleading information provided to incident commanders, according to investigators. Friday’s letter comes days after the Government Accountability Project, a nonprofit whistleblower-advocacy group, disclosed an over 900-page Freedom of Information Act request that detailed contradictory information given to the public. “Documents recently made public underscore our concerns,” Mr. Vance and Mr. Zeldin wrote. Internal emails and plume models from the vent-and-burn had estimated casualty counts that opposed publicly provided information at the time The initial plume model, which simulated the pollution, projected that over 18,000 residents could suffer “at least severe injury” due to chemical exposures, phosgene and hydrogen chloride. More than 1,900 may have been exposed to hazard levels that “could possibly result in death.” In one “learning experience” email chain, a federal modeler wondered if a plume plot “had gone public.” “Glad to hear it didn’t ??” the email reads. “I do think my favorite thing so far has been right after we got activated … I saw a video where a news station was talking to a guy that took footage. He said something like, ‘I just grabbed my phone and started running toward the fire to get some footage.’ Yikes. If only he had seen our plots first, maybe he wouldn’t have done that. Or maybe he would. There are some not-so-bright people out there, as we’re all aware,” the reply reads. The Defense Department also placed a litigation hold on the uncovered records in December 2023. Mr. Vance and Mr. Zeldin said that given “continued concerns that have been raised,” a thorough review is warranted. If the review identifies shortcomings, the letter states that the EPA will consider “appropriate corrective actions,” including changes to emergency-response procedures, environmental monitoring or interagency coordination.