Cincinnati stops using Ohio River water even though Gov. Mike DeWine says East Palestine chemicals have ‘dissipated’

Authored by cleveland.com and submitted by Mercury82jg
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COLUMBUS, Ohio—The city of Cincinnati announced Friday it will stop taking in water from the Ohio River for now as chemicals from the East Palestine train derailment head downstream.

However, the announcement came as Gov. Mike DeWine said testing has shown the plume of contaminants has “completely dissipated” by now.

In a release, Cincinnati city officials said that more than 130 water samples taken at the city’s Ohio River water intake found “no detectable levels” of the chemicals from the derailment site. However, the release stated that “out of an abundance of caution,” the city’s water system will shut off its Ohio River intake and temporarily switch to using water reserves.

“I’m confident that temporarily shutting off the Ohio River intake is the best move,” said Cincinnati City Manager Sheryl Long. “There’s zero risk that our water reserves contain contaminants from the train derailment site, and tapping these reserves will give us all peace of mind.”

DeWine, speaking at a news conference, said tests of Ohio River waters found contaminants from the derailment were at 3 parts per billion on Thursday and reached zero on Friday.

“There is no reason to be concerned about water from the Ohio River now,” DeWine said.

State officials previously said that drinking water treatment processes should remove any contaminants from the Ohio River.

The Norfolk Southern train that derailed on Feb. 3 spilled toxic chemicals such as vinyl chloride, Bbutyl acrylate, ethylhexyl acrylate, and ethylene glycol monobutyl either. Some of those chemicals got into local streams, killing fish and traveling down into the Ohio River.

The governor said Sulphur Run, one of the streams near the derailment, is “a place to be avoided” for the time being.

“It’s going to take awhile to remediate this,” DeWine said.

We_Are_Animals37 on February 19th, 2023 at 20:51 UTC »

Does anyone know if they’re conducting water sampling both surface and groundwater? That information should be available for public access.

GhettoChemist on February 19th, 2023 at 19:30 UTC »

Yes, a concentrated area will dissapate to contaminate surrounding areas. Thats how basic laws of diffusion work. Doesn't mean the crash area is safe, it means the areas around it are now unsafe.

Yarddogkodabear on February 19th, 2023 at 19:01 UTC »

During the BP disaster Rush Limbaugh was saying "oil is good for the Ocean."