Ohio Fire Chief Testifies at NTSB Hearing on Controversial Train Derailment Response

The East Palestine fire chief told investigators probing a Norfolk Southern derailment that the railroad gave him 13 minutes to decide whether to vent and burn carloads of hazardous vinyl chloride — a timeline he said left him feeling “blindsided.” The decision would change a serious derailment in early February into a national event that became the backdrop for weeks of culture war battles, generating apocalyptic images of thick black smoke spewing over the small Ohio community.