If a Train Crashes in Ohio and Nobody Talks About it, did it Really Happen? Part Duex

Guest Post by Skinny

Last week I took a swipe at Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg (or @SecretaryPete as he likes to be called) for missing in action for 11 days following the derailment of the Norfolk Southern train in East Palestine, Ohio.  Although Secretary Pete was late to the party, he made up for it all on February 19, or 16 days after the derailment.

The military man of action jumped into the fray and did what all heroes due in the time of crises.  Did he jump into his assault Prius and ride into the center of the toxic cloud and safely disperse it?  Close, but not quite.  Did he commandeer Greta Thunberg’s flying boat, scoop up the toxic fumes in its magic sails and convert the noxious gas into a harmless marijuana smoke cloud?  No, but you’re getting closer.  He did what only a true military hero worthy of a Judge Advocate General designation can do:  he wrote a letter.

The letter is to the residents of East Palestine apologizing for the abysmal failure of his Transportation Department in general and specifically the Federal Railroad Administration, that division of the Transportation Department under his tutelage that is directly responsible for railroad operations and safety.  He promised to do better and also promised to visit the stricken area sometime next year once his 3 year federally mandated paternity leave ends.  Well, like most things I write, this is also not true.  But the next part is.  He did write a letter, but not to East Palestine or anyone in it.  He doesn’t know or care where East Palestine is, and if he did, he would be repulsed to learn that it is occupied by troglodytic white republicans.  At least he will have to acknowledge that the workers braving the environmental hazards while cleaning up the mess look like the people in the local neighborhood.

As for the letter, Secretary Pete sent it to Alan Shaw, the woke CEO of Norfolk Southern.  We will get to Mr. Shaw later, but the letter needs to go first.  You can read the letter for yourself here, but that would ruin the fun of me reading it to you alongside numerous criticisms, snarky comments, and general disdain.  But it’s your choice.

Secretary Pete Buttigieg (@SecretaryPete) / Twitter

Okay, now that the smart people are gone, here goes.  Pete jumps in with the usual platitudes about lives upended by Norfolk Southern and reminding them of their commitments to take care of this problem.  Then come the threats.  The residents are not satisfied with your efforts to date.  The National Transportation Safety Board is conducting their independent review, but once they’re done, my DOT and the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) will be conducting our own review and we will use all our legal authorities to nail your ass to the wall if God forbid, we find any safety violations.  Trust me, we always find safety violations.  And don’t forget the EPA.  If you think we can make your life miserable, just imagine what they can do.

Ok, now lets talk about safety, or more accurately, how you suck at it.  Per Pete, “I am writing to stress that the future must not resemble the past when it comes to your company’s and your industry’s follow-through on support for stringent safety policies.”  Future not resemble the past, hmm? I think Lenin said that.  Furthermore, you suck now, and you sucked in 2011 when your train derailed in Arcadia, OH and 25 cars spilled ethanol causing 2o families to evacuate.  In truth, the families left their homes voluntarily to scoop up the contraband to mix with their homemade spirits.  Too bad the ethanol caught fire or that would have been one hell of a party.  Regardless, you sucked again in 2012, when 17 rail cars flipped and caught fire in Columbus, Ohio (what do you have against Ohio?).

Now that we have established your awful safety record, lets grill you over how you will act on it.  Back in the enlightened days of the Obama Administration, we the all-knowing Department of Transportation via the Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and the FRA passed a rule regarding the use of Electronic Controlled Pneumatic (ECP) Brakes for high hazard flammable trains (HHFT).  The rule was illegal because no cost analysis was done, but hey, we had a pen and a phone, and that’s how lawmaking get done in those days.  As for the cost no one really knows, the only available estimate was done back in 2006 and that price tag was a whopping $6 billion.

Microsoft PowerPoint – 04-ECP overview3A (ieee.org)

Regardless DOT went forward and implemented the rule and Secretary Pete helpfully reminds Mr. Shaw that “Your company at one time publicly touted ECP technology.”  Of course, they liked the technology.  ECP brakes apply simultaneously apply brakes throughout the train rather than wait for a signal from the front of the train to apply the brakes to the rear and other parts of the train.  ECP’s can stop the train about 40% faster, but they have a high failure rate and lengthy repair time.  Also, when the ECP’s fails there is no way to override or work around the failure.  The entire train is immovable which shuts down an entire rail line.  You can’t just pull a train over onto the shoulder and wait for AAA.  Furthermore, the National Academies of Sciences issued a report in September, 2017 that “Concludes that DOT’s efforts to validate its modeling and simulation approach did not instill sufficient confidence in DOT’s comparison of the estimated emergency performance of ECP braking systems with that of pneumatic braking systems augmented with DP (distributed power) or EOT (end of train) devices.  DOT’s efforts did not follow well-established standards for the validation of computational models.”  So the DOT’s rule would be incalculably expensive, prone to failure, capable of causing massive delays, and may not even be that much better than what we already have.  Plus, they botched the science.  Sounds like the perfect government program.

Of course, Secretary Pete doesn’t see it that way.  He chides Norfolk Southern.  “Rather than support these efforts to support railway safety, Norfolk Southern and other railway companies spent millions of dollars in the courts and lobbying members of Congress to oppose common sense safety regulations.  As a result, Congress enacted language that undermined the USDOT the ability to sustain the ECB brake requirements.”  How dare elected members of Congress pass laws that tell us unelected but otherwise enlightened bureaucrats at DOT what to do?  Why the very nerve.  What Pete fails to mention is that even if that rule had not been repealed, it wouldn’t have made a difference in this instance since the train was not considered a HFFT by the department’s own definition.  “Shut up,” he explained.  Northern Southern needs to “raise the standards to take a leadership position within the rail industry, shifting to a posture that focuses on supporting, not thwarting, efforts to raise the standard of U.S. rail safety regulation.”  The Or else is just implied.

Pete was getting rolling now.  How dare you make money he implored.  “Yours is an exceptionally profitable business.  Operating income was an astonishing $4.8 billion in 2022.”  What Pete fails to mention is that overall revenues were up $1.6 billion from 2021.  Why would a railroad experience a 14% increase over 2021.  Could it be that his boss’s decision to cancel Keystone and every other proposed pipeline in the country is forcing oil producers to ship by rail have something to do with it?   That can’t possibly be it.  Its just greed and Pete will fix it by expensive regulation and “asking Congress to raise the cap on fines against railroads for violating safety regulations.”  If they won’t do what I say, then I will bleed them dry.

Alan Shaw must have been quite shocked to receive such a letter.  After all, he is the definition of a post modern woke CEO.  Right on the first page of their website is a link to the 2022 Environmental Social and Governance Report complete with a letter from the CEO himself committing the company to the woke bromides or in the new jargon “Womides.”  He will reduce Norfolk Southern’ s carbon footprint, help others reduce their Scope 3 supply chain emissions and of course “expand our DEI initiatives, cultivating a safe, inclusive culture throughout our organization, and reaffirming our commitment to communities across our network.”  Sorry everyone, I need a minute here.  Sometimes these things just get you so that you’re so choked up you can’t help getting a little emotional.  Okay, I’m good now.

What a load of tripe.  I think many of these CEO’s actually believe this garbage, but whether they believe it or not, they think that if they spew enough of it, they will curry favor with the ruling class.   Forget it.  Pete and his ilk are true believers and there is no way a straight white billionaire is making inroads.  Sure, they will take your campaign cash and let you sit in on their idiotic business roundtables, but that’s it.  The cool kids will never let you sit at their lunch table.

As for the people of East Palestine, they can take comfort in the knowledge that Secretary Pete and Womide spewing Alan Shaw have their backs.  I just hope they have plenty of Trump Water.

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