Cleanup and remediation still a work in progress 1 year after toxic and fiery train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio
EAST PALESTINE, Ohio (KDKA) -- Saturday marks one year since 38 cars of a Norfolk Southern train derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, including 11 filled with hazardous materials.
Now one year later, the site no longer smells of chemicals from the fire and controversial controlled burn that followed, but the effects still linger.
KDKA Investigator Meghan Schiller takes us back to the tracks for the first up-close look at the remediation efforts.
Nearly one year has gone by and Norfolk Southern crews are still busy working near the site of the fiery and toxic derailment.
The remediation site is the closest that reporters have been able to get near the spot where the derailment took place.
It's often quiet and cold on the streets of East Palestine, Ohio -- until the ground rumbles.
The train's horn blares until it doesn't, serving as a reminder that things come and go through the village, but never really stay.
"It's real lonely here, you know, in Mom's house we still have all of her China, all of her pictures, and her paintings," said East Palestine resident Christina Dilworth.
Christina Dilworth just moved back to Alice Street, into her late mother's home -- but despite all of the scrubbing and cleaning, it's not the same.
She's spent the past year jumping from place to place, living anywhere but her home along the tracks, and Norfolk Southern has paid to put her up in a hotel.
"I mean, I came back because, first of all, I did not have a choice, because, you know, Norfolk's relocations is over with," Dilworth said. "Second of all since they said they were gonna be done. We just kind of thought it was done so when I came back, and it's like, no, it doesn't even look close to being done."
In the derailment zone, what once was a mess of flames and chemicals, now looks empty.
"this is the backfilling of the site," said Chris Hunsicker, Regional Manager of Environmental Operations for Norfolk Southern. "So this is clean limestone from a local quarry, which they're putting in place so we can restore ground conditions and then build it back up."
Hunsicker tells KDKA that they finished excavating in October, hauling away more than 165,000 tons of contaminated soil.
"The contaminated soil fortunately was removed back in October, so that was shipped off to licensed permitted landfills that can handle that the impacted material."
The rail giant insists that the area is safe and in October, the EPA agreed.
Hunsicker's crews continue the work while wearing protective equipment, but says that there haven't been any significant air issues for months.
A creek that still shows signs of pollution runs under homes, right through the center of East Palestine.
The EPA says that 66% of the observed areas of Sulphur Run still show an oily sheen and signs warn residents to stay away as cleanup work is still ongoing.
The EPA has shipped more than 35 million gallons of contaminated water off-site and Norfolk Southern will soon shift its focus.
"The other areas we're working on right now is making sure we've restored the ditches that flow into those streams, make sure they've been cleaned to the appropriate standards and once we get confirmation on that we'll be able to resume waterflow so we're still looking at a few months to be able to take care of all that work," Hunsicker said.
Despite saying that everything is safe, the EPA says it will continue to monitor groundwater and soil sampling, recently cleaning out four of the five underground culverts in town.
Hoses still run in the now-empty stream behind Dilworth's house and even though she's back, she says her health isn't.
"You know, it's been coming up a year here and of course, they tell us, okay, everything's safe," Dilworth said. "But like, for instance, ground zero, the Twin Towers, they told them, oh, okay, everything's safe. And now, what? 20 years later, people are getting respiratory cancer, you know, all kinds of illnesses are popping up."
KDKA asked Norfolk Southern how long they plan to be in East Palestine and they say they can't commit to a timeline right now.
They say that federal regulators continue to have asks of the company and that they need to be there to respond to those requests and also say they'll continue to do so until the work is done.