EAST PALESTINE, Ohio — More details are emerging about what happened moments before a train carrying hazardous materials derailed in East Palestine earlier this month, leading to a fire and eventually the controlled release of toxic chemicals.

What You Need To Know

  • Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg visited East Palestine Thursday

  • He praised the community and called for tougher industry regulation

  • The NTSB released an initial report on the crash Thursday, saying there’s no evidence the crew did anything wrong

On Thursday, Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg paid his first visit to the town, calling for tougher industry regulation.

Buttigieg praised the community’s poise in dealing with the disaster and vowed, after a tour of the crash site, to continue raising the bar on rail safety.

“I’m here for the work and not for the politics,” he said.

Buttigieg received criticism from some for his delay in visiting the site.

“I was taking pains to respect the role that I have and the role that I don’t have, but that should not have stopped me from weighing in about how I felt about what was happening in this community,” he said.

The derailed cars and controlled burn of toxic chemicals prompted evacuations and subsequent fear of air, water and soil contamination.

An initial report from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) released Thursday states there is no evidence the crew did anything wrong.

NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy said the train passed three detectors designed to assess the temperature of the wheel bearings. The temperature was increasing at each detection point, but did not surpass the 200-degrees-above-the-norm threshold for an alarm until just before the actual derailment.

Once a critical temperature of 253 degrees was detected, the crew took immediate action.

The NTSB has said it is looking at whether these temperature thresholds should change, noting that they are currently set by the rail companies.

Buttigieg said the NTSB’s findings are an important step toward policy-making and preventing more communities from dealing with this sort of catastrophe.

“We know that if you got a train that's a mile long, and something goes wrong halfway down it and you got one guy out there, that's gonna be a problem,” he said.

He said improvements to rail safety need to be made and that those responsible for the crash must be held accountable.

A community meeting is scheduled for Thursday night, sponsored by River Valley Organizing. It will feature independent health, environmental and legal experts as well as a panel discussion for those with questions.

Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted said Thursday’s NTSB report could be the basis of a criminal referral and that Norfolk Southern should consider buying the property of people who don’t feel safe or would like to relocate as a result of the disaster.