CeramFab files $500 million suit against NS
This article features research from Government Accountability Project’s whistleblower client, Scott Smith, and was originally published here.
EAST PALESTINE — The owner of an East Palestine business, who claims he “lost nearly everything” in the wake of the Feb. 3 train derailment, filed a $500 million lawsuit against Norfolk Southern Tuesday in the U.S. Northern District Court Of Ohio.
Edwin Wang, majority owner of CeramFab, WYG Refractories and CeramSource and Yonggong, said the disaster created an unsafe environment for his employees and forced him to close or relocate all his operations.
The lawsuit states that the businesses that are continuing to suffer “direct and substantial damages” due to “the fire and release of toxic chemicals into the air, soil and water” that followed the derailment. The six-count complaint alleges negligence, strict liability, private nuisance, public nuisance, trespass and willful and wanton conduct on the part of the railroad. The lawsuit also states that Norfolk’s actions following the derailment “created an unmitigated disaster of unimaginable portions with terrible consequences for its innocent victims.”
All four companies are located within close proximity to the derailment site, with the 80,000-square-foot CeramFab facility is located within the site itself and directly next to what Unified Command referred to as Car Scrapping Area 4 –where burned out cars were dismantled for disposal.
Aside from damages occurred from the chemicals spilled in the derailment, the ensuing fire and controlled vent and burn of vinyl chloride days later, the lawsuit maintains that the use of CeramFab’s lot as a staging area for contract workers, vehicles, and equipment, has caused additional damage to the property and excavation of the site that has resulted in multiple flood events.
“Over the next few months, defendants provided no clear indication on how long their clean-up efforts would take or how contaminated they knew plaintiffs’ business properties actually were,” the lawsuit said. “This lack of transparent communication from Norfolk Southern was coupled with multiple public third-party reports of increased community dioxin levels and persistent contamination proximate to plaintiff properties.”
The lawsuit charges that “results from soil samples, bulk building samples, and the storm sewer sampling showed that higher than expected levels of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), phthalates, and dioxins were present.”
Concern over the safety and health of CeramFab employees was also outlined in the lawsuit which alleges workers became “ill and unable to work after spending only short periods of time in the plaintiffs’ facilities” and the employees who were able work for longer periods “experienced symptoms such as burning eyes, acute breathing problems, rashes, foul odors, tastes, and other strange effects.” Wang said the inability to adequately staff shifts, concern for the wellbeing of the employees and potential liabilities for exposing workers to a potentially-contaminated building, led him to halt operations.
The complaint further states that “the initial derailment, the national spotlight, the continued clean-up, and the operational shutdown has also eroded the confidence of both existing customers and potential future customers” and that CeramFab had its first customer order cancellation within weeks of the derailment and others quickly followed.
Wang’s attorney Jon C. Conlins alleges that Norfolk Southern has a history of skirting safety regulations and disregarded known issues of 32N (train that derailed).
“When you investigate the background of Norfolk Southern, the pressure executives applied to make faster, longer trains, run with smaller crews, and to repeatedly put juiced corporate profits over even basic public safety concerns, a disaster of this magnitude was only a matter of time,” he said. “The full scope of this tragedy – on humans, animals, the community, and the environment – may not be fully known for years, but we know right now that Edwin Wang’s businesses will never fully recover. That is why we are seeking full, just, and complete compensation for all current and future damages suffered by his businesses.”
The fate of CeramFab and three other businesses (Brave Industries and U.S. Stonewares and Strohecker Industries) located within ground-zero were addressed by both the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Norfolk Southern when announcing earlier this month that all contaminated soil has been removed from the site.
EPA Response Coordinator Mark Durno said possible contamination inside the businesses located at ground zero and potentially in the soil underneath the structures — particularly CeramFab — is yet to be fully assessed and determined as laid out in Appendix E of the Characterization Work Plan for Derailment-Area Soil. According to Appendix E, reported odors inside the building reflect the need for ambient air, indoor air, and sub-slab vapor sampling. The plan also said that “potential preferential pathways” will also be considered and identified.
Norfolk Southern’s Manager of Environmental Operations Bob Scobie also referred to the vapor intrusion plan when discussing possible contamination of CeramFab, calling the plan “a year-long process of sampling and analyzing the air inside that building.”
Norfolk Southern declined to comment on the lawsuit, citing a policy of not commenting on pending litigation.