Many victims of the Ohio train derailment are upset over a $600 million settlement

Norfolk Southern Railway giant Announce The company agreed Tuesday to pay $600 million to settle consolidated class actions stemming from the derailment of one of its freight trains in East Palestine, Ohio, last year.

Money – it is said The largest settlement ever For a derailment accident in the United States – it will go to residents, property owners, and businesses located within 20 miles of the derailment site. The deal also includes a separate process for personal injury claims within a 10-mile radius.

The four lead attorneys for the plaintiffs told reporters during a press call on Wednesday that the deal is a “fantastic outcome” for East Palestine and the surrounding communities and that their clients in the civil case are all “very pleased” with the outcome. Norfolk Southern does not accept any liability or any wrongdoing or error as part of the transaction.

“We feel the ingredients accurately reflect what the community is looking for and what it deserves,” said attorney Elizabeth Graham. “The money — getting it to them at this point and getting it to them quickly — was a concern we heard over and over again from our customers in the community.”

Many details remain to be worked out, including the allocation formula to determine who gets what. But some residents of the area and Watchers closely They were quick to dismiss the amount as insufficient, given the potential long-term health effects of exposure to toxic chemicals.

A few days after the train derailed, Norfolk Southern intentionally set fire to five tank cars filled with vinyl chloride, a cancer-causing chemical used in plastics, releasing massive amounts of harmful smoke into the environment.

“I am happy to see potential progress forward regarding the impacts of the East Palestine train derailment, but there is still a lot to be done,” Misty Allison, a mother of two who lives just over a mile from the site of the derailment, told the website. “My reaction is that $600 million is not nearly enough,” HuffPost emailed.

“When all of this money is split up and paid out, the individual victims will not receive even a small portion of what Norfolk paid its executives in bonuses in the year following the delinquency. If the individual develops adverse health conditions in the future, this small settlement amount will not cover those costs.” almost.

Jami Wallace, a lifelong East Palestine resident and chairman of the East Palestine Derailment Unity Council, shared this frustration.

“What does it do for people who are still exposed and sick?” She said. “What does it do to our polluted streams?”

Lead attorneys for the plaintiffs declined to speculate Wednesday on how many people could ultimately receive the payments. But one of the lawyers, Jane Conroy, He told Reuters earlier It could be nearly 100,000, Including about 25,000 residents who live within 10 miles of the crash site and another 72,000 who live within 20 miles. Many major cities are located within 20 miles of eastern Palestine.

IIf the 100,000 figure proves accurate, this would equate to an average amount of just $6,000 per person. This is before deducting attorney fees.

Lead attorneys stressed Wednesday that the allocation process would be much more complicated than simply dividing the $600 million evenly among district residents.

“The people most affected get the most, and this is on its way out,” the lawyer said. Michael Morgan. “It's not as simple as just saying, 'There's this many people, there's this much money.' What does each person get? “That's not the intention here.”

Lawyers also pushed back on the idea that $600 million is a low number, urging community members to be patient as they work to finalize the details of the settlement in the coming months.

“I ask that they be patient and work with us through the process, and learn more, before making a final judgment on whether or not this is the right settlement for them,” the co-lead attorney said. Seth A. Katz.

“We've worked hard on it. We've looked at it from a lot of different ways… and we feel very strongly that this is a very, very good outcome for this community to get the money that's going to be distributed to them now, without the risk of litigation, without dealing with a lot of legal issues that are… Honestly, it's a very uphill battle.

The settlement comes about 14 months after the train derailment and chemical disaster. While the negotiations that led to the $600 million settlement are confidential, Graham said Norfolk South “started very low, and we started higher.” The rail giant hailed the agreement as “another promise fulfilled by Norfolk Southern to make things right for the people of East Palestine and surrounding communities.”

The plaintiffs' lawyers hope that the initial payments will be disbursed as soon as the end of this year. Anyone who receives compensation for a personal injury claim as part of the settlement will lose the ability to file future claims.

Alison spoke about the East Palestine community It will require long-term health care and it is feared that the settlement will let Norfolk Southern off the hook for future health impacts.

“East Palestine, Ohio, witnessed the largest chemical disaster in the history of the United States,” she said.

“The long-term health effects these chemicals will have on residents, not to mention first responders who inhaled toxic smoke for hours without knowing what deadly chemicals they were breathing, are still widely unknown. Look at the 9/11 responders, who were told they They will be fine after breathing in dust during the World Trade Center cleanup. These brave men and women did not get sick on September 12. It took years for the full impact to be understood.