County departments assist in East Palestine train wreck
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Feb. 6—Mahoning Township fire Chief Francis "Poncho" Exposito described Friday night's train derailment fire in East Palestine, Ohio, as "the largest fire I've ever seen."
Exposito, who has been fighting fires for several decades, estimated the size of the blaze was about four football fields long, and the flames rose 40 to 50 feet high in the air.
Gov. Josh Shapiro at a news conference Monday warned anyone in Pennsylvania within a one-mile-by-two-mile evacuation zone to leave the area. That would involve residents just over the Pennsylvania border in Beaver County.
"Let me be very very clear," Shapiro emphasized. "If you are in this red zone that is on the map, and you refuse to evacuate, you are risking death."
He warned people in the orange area risk permanent lung damage within a matter of hours or days if exposed.
About 50 train cars had derailed and caught fire on a Norfolk Southern rail line around 9 p.m. Friday, not far from the Beaver County line. A state of emergency was declared in the village of East Palestine, and 20 of the 100 cars on the train reportedly were carrying hazardous chemicals, including vinyl chloride and benzene.
Vinyl chloride, used to make the polyvinyl chloride hard plastic resin in a variety of plastic products, is associated with increased risk of liver and other cancers, according to the federal government's National Cancer Institute. Norfolk Southern was to provide a fact sheet listing all chemicals involved.
A one-mile evacuation radius around the site remained in place Monday, which included a part of Beaver County, Chad Strobel, Lawrence County public safety director, reported earlier Monday.
Mahoning Township's was one of seven volunteer fire departments summoned from Lawrence County on Friday night to help battle the blaze that forced residents to leave their homes throughout the weekend because of the potentially hazardous chemical fumes and the potential for explosions from the train accident.
Strobel said the Lawrence County Department of Public Safety also responded Friday with its foam firefighting trailer, which was staged in Chippewa, Beaver County. Beaver County is a border county to Ohio.
The Lawrence County fire departments' job, collectively, was to shuttle water from nearby towns to get water to the fire scene and to actually help fight the fire.
"There were many locations where we went to get water to the fire scene," Exposito said, adding, "Mostly, the water was being used to keep buildings cool.
"We got close enough to the fire that I felt the heat," he said.
"It was a well-organized setup there," Exposito continued. "There were multiple sites where we were dumping water."
He said his department went out around 11:30 p.m. Friday when it was tripped out by the Lawrence County 911 center. Five other firefighters were on standby at Mahoning's station while he and his crew responded. They were at the scene for about six hours.
"Everyone was working well together," he said of the effort.
Other responding volunteer departments from Lawrence County were Bessemer, New Beaver Borough, North Beaver Township, Chewton and Enon Valley, each of which sent one water tender truck to assist and Wampum, which sent an engine and a rescue unit.
Charles Kelly, Wampum Volunteer Fire Department chief, said nine men in his department were called out for manpower around 9:50 p.m., to help set up monitors and full hose.
They were right at the scene, he said, which he described as "a lot of fire departments working together."
Train cars were on fire, but there were no fumes that they could smell, and they did not wear extra breathing protection, other than their regular turnout gear.
The North Beaver Township Volunteer Fire Department took seven members and its engine, and were right at the fire scene, according to its chief, Jason Daughtry.
"It was busy. There were a lot of firemen and there was a lot of activity going on," he said. "The fire was very large and was difficult to access, because where the train had stopped blocked what we knew as the main thoroughfares to get into town."
They had to travel over one of the overhead bridges, which passed over some of the rail cars that had been damaged.
The local units were called out about 2 1/2 hours after the derailment, he said. The East Palestine fire department was in charge of the scene. Wampum, Bessemer and Mahoning's departments worked alongside North Beaver.
Daughtry said the fumes from the wreckage were like a chemical smell in the air. His men didn't have to wear special breathing gear, because they weren't close enough and the wind was blowing in another direction.
"Our job was to support them at the fill site and assisting the crews on scene. The East Palestine department was doing a lot of work with aerial trucks with hoses on them, called 'master streams,'" he explained. He said the wreckage was still burning Monday morning and the scene was still too volatile to for firefighters get in there and do hand work. The reason is, although some of the tank cars have built-in pressure relief devices, if they stop acting correctly there is a possibility of an explosion, he said.
Strobel said all Lawrence County units were cleared and returning to their stations by 2 a.m. Saturday. None have been sent back there since then.
Shapiro said at his news conference no water or air contaminants had been detected to have impacted Pennsylvania. The EPA is working with Ohio and federal partners to monitor quality conditions in the region.
