Disasters

"A U.S. train derailment that spilled toxic chemicals in an Ohio town might have been avoided if the railway company's alarm system had given engineers an earlier warning that bearings were overheating, the chair of the National Transportation Safety Board said on Thursday with the release of a preliminary investigation."

"American homes in flood zones are overvalued by hundreds of billions of dollars, according to a study published on Thursday in the journal Nature Climate Change."

"Long before this month’s fiery derailment, railroad industry leaders battled regulations meant to boost freight train safety, including plans to bolster some of the very same tank cars that ruptured and released chemicals in eastern Ohio."

"The Environmental Protection Agency will take control of the response to the Ohio train derailment and order rail company Norfolk Southern to clean up the contamination, the agency said Tuesday, the Biden administration’s strongest response yet to the disaster."

"A massive winter storm spreading across the U.S. West into the Northern Plains and Midwest on Tuesday could produce blizzards, brutal cold, and record snowfall, making road travel treacherous and disrupting air travel."

"Communities alongside rail lines had two more close calls this week as freight trains carrying hazardous materials derailed in Houston and Detroit."

"California's largest and most expensive environmental cleanup has failed to properly remove lead pollution from some homes and neighborhoods near a notorious battery recycler in southeast Los Angeles County, leaving residents at continued risk, a Los Angeles Times investigation shows."

"When dead birds fall from the sky, you know something is wrong. But finding out exactly what killed them isn’t as easy."

"The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved new rules Thursday to help protect the electricity system during severe winter weather, but grid experts said more action is needed to prevent deadly power outages like those that occurred during Winter Storm Uri."

"A cyclone which is intensifying as it approaches the southeastern African coast has been labeled as “dangerous” by the United Nation’s weather agency on Monday as nations brace for landfall."