Environmental Health

NTSB Opens Special Probe Of Norfolk Southern Safety Practices And Culture

"Federal investigators are opening a wide-ranging investigation into one of the nation’s biggest railroads following a fiery derailment on the Ohio-Pennsylvania border last month and several other accidents involving Norfolk Southern, including the death of a train conductor Tuesday."

Source: AP, 03/08/2023

"What To Know About The 'Red Tide' Hitting Florida Beaches"

"The harmful "red tide," which has been known to discolor coastal waters and kill marine life off the coast of Florida, has returned for another year.

The toxic organism that paints the waters red was detected in February and was found at higher-than-normal levels in several Southwest Florida counties in recent days, state officials said.

Since it returned, grisly photos of dead fish washing up on Florida beaches have proliferated, and federal authorities are warning people of the possibility of respiratory irritation from contaminated air."

Source: NPR, 03/07/2023

"EPA Mandates States Report On Cyber Threats To Water Systems"

"The Biden administration on Friday said it would require states to report on cybersecurity threats in their audits of public water systems, a day after it released a broader plan to protect critical infrastructure against cyberattacks."

Source: AP, 03/06/2023

Plan To Incinerate Soil From Ohio Derailment Is ‘Horrifying’ - Expert

"Contaminated soil from the site around the East Palestine train wreck in Ohio is being sent to a nearby incinerator with a history of clean air violations, raising fears that the chemicals being removed from the ground will be redistributed across the region."

Source: Guardian, 03/06/2023

From Swine Waste, Student Journalist Extracts Prize-Winning Story

Industrial hog farmers tout swine biogas as a clean, green energy source, but others point to its messy side. A young journalist who investigated the underreported stench of environmental racism associated with this technology learned valuable lessons along the way to producing a feature story that won her a Society of Environmental Journalists’ award for outstanding student reporting.

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Will Thousands of Orphan Wells Be Safely Plugged?

Abandoned oil and gas wells are found in significant numbers in some 27 states. Reporters who want to track their status can dig into several databases, but will need to support their data crunching with lots of shoe-leather and ground-truth reporting. Reporter’s Toolbox has insights into what the databases offer. Plus, a primer on API numbers.

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Diving Deeper on the Wetlands Beat Yields Groundbreaking Coverage

Two journalists covering water policy used a wide range of reporting techniques, from FOIA appeals to on-the-ground reporting, to get at the heart of how problems with wetlands and waterways in the United States are tied to climate change concerns. Inside Story spoke with Hannah Northey and Kevin Bogardus of E&E News about their award-winning beat reporting.

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