- The warehouse fire comes after a Norfolk Southern train carrying industrial chemicals derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, on February 3, raising concerns about air and water quality in the Ohio River Basin.
- Authorities evacuated all residents within one mile of the crash and started a controlled burn of the volatile chemicals to decrease the risk of an explosion, which could have sent shrapnel throughout the small town.
- Vinyl chloride, a carcinogen used to manufacture PVC, was therefore released from five train cars last week in the form of massive plumes of dark smoke visible throughout eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania.
