The Way Life Goes

Can’t wake up because I’m not done dreaming, can’t find the words because they’ve lost all meaning. This is my main blog, but most of y’all should know me as @firewithinthewitch ❤️

[aidashakur]

[siir-poesia]

[desactivemaintenant-deactivated]

[cocotropic2]

Coco

[1st-1]

[beardedmrbean]

[poetry-siir]

[catchymemes]

[thedankmemes]

[dct239394cvvd098dffgggp]

real and true

[socialmaya]

[theballadofdawn]

As a geologist, the only thing I have to say is… r o c k s 😎🪨

[flagellant]

I truly don't have any words about what's happening in Ohio right now. I want to post something like I usually do. Give vocabulary, etc, whatnot. It's important, it's so important. But I don't have words. What could I possibly say about the level of devastation that has happened, is happening, will happen in the future? This is worse than the BP spill. And I don't know how to respond to that with anything other than a shocked numbness.

[flagellant]

There has been a complete media black out regarding the catastrophic and deadly environmental disaster currently happening in Ohio right now, which began a full week ago at time of writing.

A train filled with extremely toxic and reactive chemicals, specifically vinyl chloride, was derailed. A cloud of poisonous chemicals has sprouted and since the cloud is heavier-than-air, it will persist to continue to travel downwind, polluting the atmosphere and environment of everything it touches. All pets will die. Reaching the Mississippi will completely eradicate the safety of all its waters from that point and everywhere downstream. Creeks are already filled with dead fish which the Ohio government claims is not to be worried about. The entire state's soils and ecosystems will be contaminated to deadly carcinogenic levels for the rest of all our lives and far beyond it. If and when it reaches the Gulf of Mexico the currents will carry its poisons globally.

I wish I could say anything of hope right now. I wish I could even say I'm angry. But I'm not right now. I just feel numb. The scale of this is just so beyond anything I can comprehend and there's an explicit and purposeful refusal to report on this.

[tarilaran]

Article discussing some of the safety concerns:

While vinyl chloride itself is a carcinogen, the burning of the chemical, which releases hydrogen chloride and phosgene, can be immediately lethal. Phosgene, a highly toxic, colorless gas with a strong odor, was notoriously used as a weapon during World War I.

Another article:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90848025/ohio-train-derailment-toxic-chemicals-pvc-spill-fire-disaster

Meanwhile, the crash site was leaching other hazardous materials besides vinyl chloride. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says they seeped into surrounding waterways, and “were immediately toxic to fish”—though it added that “actions were taken to minimize that.” The agency has assured the public that, the poor aquatic life’s fate notwithstanding, everybody’s drinking water was “protected.”

Yesterday [Feb 9 2023], the agency announced that the air in East Palestine was finally deemed safe enough for residents to return.

The oldest source I can find discussing this is from Feb 8.

WHEELING — West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice on Wednesday said Norfolk Southern’s train that derailed Friday in East Palestine, Ohio, did lead

[ms-demeanor]

Here is the New York Times reporting on this on February 4th.

Here are NBC and The Daily Beast reporting on this on February 5th.

Here are People Magazine, the Sacramento Bee, The Daily Beast again, CBS News, Reuters, and Reuters again reporting on this on February 6th.

Here is CNN reporting on it on February 7th.

The EPA response profile has been active and updating since February 4th.

I want to preface this by saying THIS IS NOT GOOD, and we shouldn't act like nothing is happening. This is bad. This is a serious environmental disaster. There are currently risks to humans and animals, and risks to humans and animals will be ongoing for quite some time at various levels.

However I think that "this will kill all the pets in the area and will lay a swathe of poison from Ohio to Mexico, burning the world between" is perhaps something of an overstatement and I'm aware that folks are upset about this but holy shit let's please try not to catastrophize the catastrophe.

The purpose of an intentional burn at the site was as a containment measure, because it is better to temporarily have extremely toxic chemical byproducts in an evacuated area than it is to allow an extremely carcinogenic chemical to slowly disperse.

There was a similar chemical spill in New Jersey in 2012 (still not a good thing! Not something that we should let go lightly!) and it did not result in "all pets dying" or a mass poisoning of rivers and streams.

Here is the DHHS Toxological Profile for Vinyl Chloride, a nearly 300-page document that goes over risk factors and harms caused by the chemical. Given the tone of the original post, here's what people probably want to see right now:

At the moment, there appears to be one man who claims that his pet fox died as a result of exposure to the vinyl chloride, and it sickened some of his other pets. There is some discussion of dead chickens and one dead hawk was found. Dead fish were found in some bodies of water, and the EPA is monitoring other bodies and has issued directives for dams and spillovers to collect chemical runoff to prevent as much downstream contamination as possible. At the moment, it is very difficult to say whether there will be a significant amount of acute animal deaths (wild or domesticated) as a result of this, though I would guess there will be a very significant increase of cancer in the area in the coming years.

One reporter at a press conference from the Ohio governor was arrested, he has been released and the AG's office is investigating his arrest. There are a lot of photos of the derailment and its consequences on social media and other news websites, and it does not appear that anyone is preventing people from taking or sharing photos of the disaster.

Look. I am not someone who thinks that you should blindly trust the government. There are huge issues here. This is a disaster that happened for a number of reasons, many of which are related to absolute shit regulation of chemical transportation and which were probably exacerbated by overworked railroad employees who got fucked over for the sake of the economy in December. There is bad shit here that is worthy of criticism, there are legitimate things to be concerned about.

But just because I don't trust the government doesn't mean I think it's a better idea to trust a shitpost account on twitter that provided "evidence" in the form of an instagram account posting screenshots of text messages from one guy who had a collection of exotic animals he wasn't able to retrieve from the evacuation area and a tiktok video.

There are definitely things to worry about with this, but please don't panic.

Also look, if the news is too miserable and you don't want to look at it too much but you want to at least pretend to stay informed, the Daily Beast's Cheat Sheet is a constant stream of paragraph-long reports on breaking news. Two of the stories I linked up above are from the Cheat Sheet. Just. Keep it open in a browser tab and check headlines once a day, okay? This has been news for an entire week, if People Magazine is doing human interest stories on it there isn't a media blackout please don't get your news from twitter or tumblr please I am begging you.

[vvhitelace]

y’all just ever feel empty as fuck

[pixelartpeach]

They’re trying to tie so they can share the 1st place medal

🐌

🐌

Voting ended onJan 28, 2023

[headspace-hotel]

I have to know if most people are checking the notes before they vote on these or if they're just going on vibes in a manner that would be fascinating to a game theorist

[wo-control]

might fuck around and haunt your dreams for a bit

[weltenwellen]

Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

[luckydreaming]

Don’t post your negativity on a positive post.

[mancomics]

Electrons

[luckydreaming]

I should kick your ass. 

[remanence-of-love]