More than a dozen of 30+ cars of an eastbound Norfolk Southern freight train derailed Tuesday night near Ripley, in Chautauqua County, in western NY, The site is within a few miles of the shore of Lake Erie. The railway company determined that at least one car was leaking ethanol. Local residents within a 1,000-foot radius were evacuated from their homes and/or sheltered in-place.
Hazmat teams from the county, state and railroad responded to the scene, as well as one EPA OSC who is stationed in Buffalo, NY. Air monitoring by local Haz-Mat responders showed no levels of air contamination above background. There was no fire and only two of the ethanol cars had leaks, which were relatively minor (< 5 gals/minute). As of 0900 hours on 3/2 one leaking ethanol tank car was plugged and the other leaking ethanol car was being off-loaded into frac tanks for temporary storage. There were no leaks from any of the other cars that derailed.
EPA has deployed a team of technical contractors to the scene with air monitoring equipment which will supplement on going air monitoring.
Additional information will be released as it becomes known.
