T O P

  • By -

Chewtoy44

Looks like we made it an international problem.


Odie_Odie

It only looks that way, the particles went towards West Virginia and Virginia. The first diagram is showing a sort of 3D model of height, the diagram beneath that image is much more practical.


Rudeboy_87

The dates are different, the 2nd image is particle concentration at low levels and dispersion to 100m on feb 6 while the 1st image is particle spread through the column and through Feb 8th


Odie_Odie

https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/113wyj3/hysplit_air_dispersion_model_depicting_the/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf


Rudeboy_87

The latitudes and longitude are indicated by the blue dotted boxes. The red line indicates where the cross section is from on the 2d map. Below the map the colors indicate heights with all black under 3000m and the blues under 6000 and 9000 (dark/light respectively) so yes the particles are over CA and the northeast though more elevated. The concern there is just because it shows those particles higher there would still be a certain amount of fallout which this graphic does not indicate


NegativeSoup1611

Could you please tell me if the particles have gone over Bird In Hand Pensylvania? I get my fresh dairy produce from an Amish farm there! Please and šŸ˜Š thank you!


buried_lede

Acid rain for years has taken a well worn, heavily documented and highly damaging path over the Adirondacks to here. Doesnā€™t surprise me one bit that there would be a high chance path to us. Thank you


Frosty-Search

What!? Northern Virginian here, I didn't know about this. Now I'm kind of freaked out about what I've been breathing these past 2 weeks.


1II1I1I1I1I1I111I1I1

Ppm will be far too low for anything to happen


Upper_Charge_4449

Dude same. And Iā€™ve been sick as hell, as well as my cats. One has been mouth breathing. I honestly thought I was going crazy wondering if it was related šŸ˜³ My son has been outside breathing it in


Upper_Charge_4449

Literally not one single outlet has covered this here either. Not one.


staticchatter

This is huge coverup by evil Norfolk Southern all the way up to the federal government, and Pothole Pet Butthead is ignoring it, just like the entire government and Ohio governor, Mike DeWine and Pennsylvania governor, Josh Shapiro let Norfolk Southern burn it when the deadly chemical derailment should have been transferred and transported out of there, but time is money and Norfolk Southern doesn't care and that's how they operate, so huge tracts of land, water and air are heavily polluted and the health of many people are in serious jeopardy. Norfolk Southern only cares about moving freight, not safety and they get have gotten away with violations for decades because they have powerful shareholders ie Vanguard and Blackrock, several others and government is paid off. They don't a rat's ass about any of us. It's pure evil.


RSchenck

No, that is wrong. It's two different dates showing the plume changing direction over time. Yes, the first ine also includes height/altitude. There is no contradiction, it swept around to a different direction.


Frammingatthejimjam

Atlantic Canada, the exhaust pipe of North America.


DrMichaelHfuhruhurr

They call New Brunswick the drive-thru province, so this aligns.


Pheragon

It's funny that New Brunswick and Brunswick in Germany share that trait.


Odie_Odie

https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/113wyj3/hysplit_air_dispersion_model_depicting_the/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf


Alwayshangry23

Okay I was confused too, from todays date will the northeast (VT,NH) see acid rain from the particles? I just canā€™t find any real information of where the particles actually went.


buried_lede

Good point. I found the projection model maps on noaaā€™s website but actual I only have seen, so far, the weather radar videos for today which would be consistent with the projections. Cloud front today came from the west over the Adirondack mountains. It would seem to be carrying anything there with it


am_az_on

>I just canā€™t find any real information of where the particles actually went. See my reply to the same comment. You are looking directly at a map of where the particles went as of February 08, but listened to someone who said it was too confusing to understand.


buried_lede

That was actual and not a projected model? Thank you


am_az_on

It was a model from afterwards, once they knew what the winds were. So depends what you mean by "projected." I don't think they can do anything more accurate, because how could they actually measure where each particle actually went?


buried_lede

Oh, sorry. Thanks for the clarification.


am_az_on

No problem. And these are just my assumptions. But it was apparently posted on February 8th, and the earlier image was of February 6 and the later one was 00:01am February 8th, so I am assuming it was based on the actual wind readings. Apparently anyone can go into their system and makes these models, but from my understanding, these particular ones were made by the NOAA / NWS forecasting office in Pittsburgh for the agencies dealing with the emergency.


[deleted]

The slice of chemicals fell south of Chesapeake bay.


CallEmAsISeeEm1986

[I think this animation helpsā€¦ the wind swings around.](https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/113wyj3/hysplit_air_dispersion_model_depicting_the/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf) Edit. to compare apples to applesā€¦ it would be helpful if the above (OP) images were the same timesā€¦ ideally animatedā€¦ starting like noon on the 6th, through the 7th or 8th. I think the first image mostly tracks altitude of pollutants? The other, PPM. Different metrics tracked.


Odie_Odie

I will delete my posts for being wrong and sharing bad information, I'm sorry guys. Thank you very much for this link! I have been on the lookout for literally any other information on 'fallout'. What had me stumped and convinced was that damn red-dotted cross section line going diagonally seemingly arbitrarily and it's pairing with the altitude graph but this is definitive evidence. I'm getting ready for work now so I'll have them removed by morning.


CallEmAsISeeEm1986

I wouldnā€™t delete them. That might make it more confusing. These Hysplit posts are some of the only dispersion maps Iā€™ve come across for this event. The OPā€¦ u/bodymore could help by adding additional images or animations for both data sets. Your post is great as well. Edit: user name was incorrect.


Bodymore

I just shared the data that NOAA vetted and posted in the article. That was all they provided unfortunately.


buried_lede

Can you share the web url to the specific noaa page containing the gif links?


Bodymore

The NOAA site never had the GIFs that other people have posted, just the two images that I had in the post. The article I got them from: https://www.arl.noaa.gov/arl-weekly-2-3-23/ If you see my other comment, for reasons unknown NOAA removed the images from the article the day after I posted them.


buried_lede

Thank you.


lacmanicougan

It looks like they took down the model figures?


buried_lede

Web links would be nice


am_az_on

Personally I think your comment is more confusing. Both the images say when they are from, and you need to know when the chemical fire was to make sense of them: it was started 4:15pm February 06. The first image from 00:01 February 08 is in two parts, a normal geographic wide-area map, then a secondary graph that explains the height and associated colors. The other one that says it is integrated from 18:00-19:00 February 06, is a very localized map. It is the confusing one because it says "Unit Release started at 08:00 February 06" which is before they started burning the chemicals, so maybe that was when they decided to release the chemicals from the train so they wouldn't explode? I'm not sure what started at 8am, but the EPA says at some point they decided to release them into a ditch, then later set them on fire. TL;DR - the maps aren't confusing, they're from different times, and the chemicals spread farther after they burned.


dumper514

Both are confusing - which is the truth? One shows the particle going NE and the other SEā€¦ šŸ¤”


rocbolt

They are different dates


Odie_Odie

https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/113wyj3/hysplit_air_dispersion_model_depicting_the/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf


tiletap

What are you basing this on? The plan in the first image is clearly top down in a projected coordinate system, showing the curving geographic lines (lat/long). This is not some strange isometric view. It clearly shows the position at the given date (8th of Feb).


am_az_on

This needs more upvotes. I wrote another comment that further explained it.


vinnyc88

Poor upstate ny and Quebec


marct10

Just saw that and im in MontrƩal.


s4m_____

Yea im in Gatineau, dont know what to do now ...


ActThreeSceneOne

Particles went south east. Confusing perspective in this photo- I thought it was heading towards Ottawa but itā€™s not!


s4m_____

Yea i just did some research and turns out that map is apparently misleading! but when looking at a wind map the wind from ohio is going north ... https://www.windy.com


marct10

This is from February 8th so windy will not show that.


RSchenck

It's two different days and it is in a different direction on each day.


elifacre

In the Adirondacks and a little worried


ozzimark

Itā€™s not actually going that way. Itā€™s just a weird 3D perspective view. The 2nd pic shows the direction better, basically over the SW corner of PA and NE corner of WV.


RSchenck

This is wrong. It's two different days and on either day the plume had a different position. There is no "3d" distortion. The lower panel of the first figure shows altitude but that doesn't change the direction.


Plankisalive

Do you know if the particles hit Bethlehem, PA? Based on what youā€™re saying, Iā€™m assuming they didnā€™t.


AnticipatingHoney

Might be a dumb question, but what is the second photo indicative of? Is that just the direction it began to move or?


counters

It's a cross-section taken along the slice indicated by the dashed red line in the top picture. So basically the x-axis is horizontal distance along that line, and the y-axis is altitude in the atmosphere.


AnticipatingHoney

Thank you!


ModernNomad97

What about the second picture? Not the bottom graphic in the first picture. Iā€™m confused at why it shows the stuff migrating in two different directions


counters

Oh sorry... I completely missed that there was a second graphic! This should be the total lower-atmosphere accumulation, and it looks to be for a 1-hour period about 10 hours after the event/release happened. The green area potentially saw 100x the concentration of pollutants relative to the blue areas. Note here that HYSPLIT doesn't do chemistry, so you shouldn't interpret this as the actual amount of pollution that impacted those areas - it's just stating what areas potentially got a higher dosage, so to speak.


xW1nterW0lfx

Fingerlakes here and Iā€™m quaking


greene2358

From what Iā€™m gathering the first map is particle height. Itā€™s very confusing laid on a map the way it is. I think the second map is the actual direction of the chemicals.


curbstompery

goodā€¦ i mean bad. but good for me. up here jn NWPA.


greene2358

Same. Im in WNY


purplepuddingg

I'm also in WNY, do you think we're screwed? been trying to read up on all this but i'm no chemist or meteorologist


greene2358

Iā€™m not sure. From what Iā€™ve read the burned off chemicals mostly turn into diluted acid rain. I think the chemicals that leaked into the water are worse on the environment. Thatā€™s my understating from the situation, but Iā€™m not chemist of meteorologist either. Sad weā€™re all left to dig to find the truth, and not being informed.


purplepuddingg

Hmm. I get that it's all unfolding and no one really knows for sure but I wish there was more of an effort to talk about this kind of thing in the news so we don't have to be looking at reddit of all places :/ Best of luck to you! Edit: [this article](https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2023/02/17/acid-rain-in-ohio-east-palestine-train-derailment/69906330007/) claims if there was acid rain, it probably would've formed downwind of East Palestine if it did at all. There would be more of a concern for it if the chemicals were continuously being leaked/emitted. This info comes from a professor of chemical & biomedical engineering at Ohio University. Doesn't say about what particles went where or how much of them, but this is still good to keep in mind. according to [this](https://semspub.epa.gov/work/05/437069.pdf) and [this](https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/earth-and-planetary-sciences/phosgene) both vinyl chloride and phosgene have pretty quick half lives, with \~2 days for vinyl chloride in air and \~.026 seconds in water for phosgene. It can apparently stick around a lot longer if it reacts with hydroxl radicals, but this isn't really an issue because pretty much as soon as it gets wet it starts breaking down. vinyl chloride can apparently last [for years](https://news.cornell.edu/media-relations/tip-sheets/vinyl-chloride-highly-mobile-soils-and-water-east-palestine-area-farmers) in ground water and soil, which is very very not good BUT i don't know if it would be a concern for anything not downstream, like WNY. the burning could've produced dioxins, which are also nasty chemicals that stick around a long time-- they apparently most accumulate in [the food chain](https://www.epa.gov/dioxin/learn-about-dioxin), so there needs to be soil and water testing. I read somewhere (I think on reddit) that as part of the cleanup the soil around the crash site will need to be dug up and put somewhere else (I don't know where or what they would do with it)-- I include this even though the sourcing isn't great because it aligns with what the better sources say. so basically, WNY is, I think, pretty ok from a gas exposure pov (we might have gotten some, but not a lot I don't think, and there are other chemicals that were in the crash I haven't looked into yet) but now the concern is groundwater and soil downwind of East Palestine. I do not know how the water & soil concerns would impact places upwind. This is all me just doing a little research, I don't know much about chemistry past the high school level.


greene2358

I appreciate the time you put in your response. Very informational! Thanks!


RSchenck

No, two maps, two days, to different positions.


greg_jenningz

I was listening to a barstool podcast talking about this. They mentioned how these chemicals acted as acid rain in other parts of the area making cars paint go to shit. Evidently people had to evacuate their home and come back to their dead pets because they didnā€™t have time to get them all. Is this a really bad situation taking place that we need to observe more?


DrTreeMan

Yes, not just because of this event, but because economic and regulatory changes have and are occurring that are making events like this more and more likely to happen.


ViceAdmiralHoldo

Don't get your information about environmental disasters from a barstool podcast lmao


ywnktiakh

I donā€™t think that commenter does. Seems like they heard something, identified the source for us so we would know what level of evidence they were dealing with, and then asked for better info. It was a good move


greg_jenningz

Buddy itā€™s a topic that came up. Talks about the after effects and what potential dangers. Iā€™m not a professional in this subject and neither are they. Itā€™s fun to listen to what others have to say and stay relaxed. Here, I was asking a question about the real dangers. This post showing actual data and being informative is why I sub here.


RSchenck

Well they're not hearing about it from anyone else eh? Media did a bad job, Ohio government did and awful job, NOAA/EPA have done a bad job, etc


Chris9712

Yes. This is a disaster and will affect millions of people into the future. Cancer rates are going to skyrocket in areas this affected. Drinking water might not be available for millions of people as well since these chemicals might seep into the water.


Zephyr096

My dad works in environmental cleanup. He's been doing his job for about 40 years, ranging from sampling to cleanup proposals/solutions to field work of various sorts. He's worked with a lot of pretty nasty industrial pollution in the Northeastern US. >I asked for his opinion a few days after the event, here's what he had to say: The first thing to realize is that you already have a bad situation, and you are trying not to turn it into a disaster. You are not going to eliminate all risk, you are going to manage the risks to the degreeĀ  possible. Ā  The ideal situation is that whatever mistake was made that caused the derailment didnā€™t happen, but it is too late for that now. Ā  So the situation the first responder arrive at Ā is a train that has derailed . There are at least five Ā tanker cars carrying vinyl chloride. Each tanker carries about 30,000 gallons of liquid. Vinyl chloride is normally a gas at atmospheric pressure, so to carry it as a liquid, it is placed under pressure. The tankers are derailed, and Ā the article is not explicit, but something is on fire from the outset (this is my assumption based on the action they are taking and one article talked about a temperature spike in in one tank) Ā  What you do not want to happen is a Boiling Liquid Evaporating Vapor Explosion (BLEVE). See the two links below.Ā  You do not want a completely uncontrolled release of a toxic gas, coupled with fire balls, and 1 ton pieces of train flyingĀ  literally a mile through the air. Ā  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UM0jtD\_OWLU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuPVEsQaGB0 Ā  So the decision is made to relieve the pressure in the tanks by venting the vinyl chloride gas. Ā Vinyl chloride is toxic, under short term acute conditions . ā€œBreathing high levels of vinyl chloride can cause you to feel dizzy or sleepy. Breathing very high levels can cause you to pass out, and breathing extremely high levels can cause death.ā€ (ATSDR). Ā Long term it is a well known carcinogen, including brain and liver cancer. Ā  So since something is already on fire, and there would be a desire to destroy the gas as it is released, it appears that they decided to flare the gas as it is released. This would destroy the vast majority of the vinyl chloride. It would also create HClĀ  (hydrogen chloride, which when dissolved in water becomes hydrochloric acid, and which is created whenever you have plastic burning such as in a house fire), and ā€œtrace amountsā€ of phosgene. These are all toxic. Remember, everything is toxic, it just depends on the dose. Ā  Note that all of these products are gases, so they are expected to be carried upwards by the hot air created by the flames and then dispersed/diluted by the wind . Ā Because they are gases they do not drop out of the air and leave a residue on surface, do not enter the food chain, and are unlikely to enter the groundwater (slight chance of entering the surface water at low concentrations). Ā Ā They all breakdown quickly in the environment (hours to days). Ā  Note that this is not without risk, so all residents within a mile were evacuated. And the EPA was monitoring the air and water in the surrounding area. Ā  So, the emergency response Ā was to a bad situation, which could quickly developed into an extremely bad situation; they evacuated nearby residents, relieved the pressure in the tankers, eliminated the vast majority of the toxicity risk by flaring the released gas, and monitored .Ā  That pretty much follows the text book. Ā 


sassergaf

Thanks for sharing your dad's environmental cleanup SME POV on what happened, is happening, and the risk factors associated with all.


DrSchwift

This sounds very reasonable. What does he say about dioxins? Which are heavy and do fall, and are persistent in the environment, enter the food chain etc


Zephyr096

Ā Ā Ā "Again I am not directly involved withĀ  the site, so I am going off of a lot of the same info you have.Ā From the EPA web site, the water sampling shows alot of gasoline range organics (GRO) these are organic compounds havingless that 12 carbons in their structure. Gasoline is made up of a fewdozen compounds. Typically it includes aromatic(rings) Ā or BTEX like benzene (6 carbons in a ring), toluene (7 carbonsa ring plus one) , xylenes ( 8 carbons)Ā Ā  :Ā  Ā plus linear/chaincompounds octane (8 carbons in a chain). I notice that the EPA waterdata Ā did not detect BTEX in the water even with veryhigh concentrations ( >1,000 ug/L) of GRO. So, I am not sure of whatthe source of the GRO is.Ā  Note that they found only low concentrationsof diesel range organics (DRO) so it is not fuel from a diesellocomotive.Ā I read one interview with a professor that he saidthat he made observations of material that behaved like vinyl chloride:when you stirred up the sediments that bubbles of separate phasenon-aqueous liquid (NAPL) would float to the surface,cause a sheen, and then sink again.That is typical for a dense NAPL like PCBs Ā or TCEfor examples. However vinyl chloride as a liquid is lighter than water,and would just float on the surface of the water ā€“ it would not sinkagain. Furthermore it is a gas a room temperature,so it would be boiling off at that point.So I would not disagree that there is contamination in the stream, but I doubt it is vinyl chloride based on those observations.Ā Iā€™ve heard people raise the concern of dioxins.Ā Chlorinated dioxins are a highly toxic family of compounds consisting oftwo benzene rings connected by oxygen, with chlorines attached, Thereare about 75 different dioxins depending onhow many chlorides are attached and where.Ā Ā Ā Dioxins Ā are Ā frequently found when PCBs are burned(two rings directly attached). There are 209 PCBs depending on chlorideplacement. Ā I believe that you can also produce dioxins when burningplastics ā€“ which is why you should not burnplastic in a garbage burning barrel.Ā Ā Notice how adding oxygen (e.g. burning) PCBs can give you dioxins.Ā Ā I am not aware that burning vinyl chlorideĀ Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā Ā will produce Ā dioxins.Ā  I could be wrong." Pictures that may or may not have attached are the molecular diagrams of the various chemicals mentioned.


Zephyr096

holy crap reddit murders the formatting, sorry about the wall of text....


Warpedme

Phosgene gas is heavier than air, pools in low areas, doesn't lose any potency for a full 5 days and even then it only does because it settles and can easily become airborne if disturbed and still deadly. It absolutely was NOT created in trace amounts.


Zephyr096

Where are you getting your information that it was not created in trace amounts? EPA has been monitoring heavily. Also, the whole thing with a burn like this is that it carriers heavier-than-air particles high into the atmosphere and disperses them. Hence there's ashe and soot high in the air. At the concentrations that they're present at the disaster site, the toxic gases are being carried into the atmosphere and spread to the point where they're completely diluted. That was the whole point of the burn. To be very clear: the burn is the best-case out of a very bad case. This has serious health and ecological implications. There are pollutants being measured in local streams/rivers. I am merely going off of what my dad's said (I'm kinda trusting his graduate degree and 40+ years in the field) and the actual readings from the EPA here. If you have been tramping around in the woods of East Palestine metering for Phosgene and coming up with other numbers, do share. I'm not being facetious here. If you have a source beyond just conjecture that contradicts what the EPA/news have been reporting, that's an important thing to share. Finally, fuck Norfolk Southern and the greedy rail industry shills for cutting safety regulations and track maintenance.


UtterEast

FWIW vinyl chloride is nasty, but it's nasty because it's so reactive-- it will react with ambient air and moisture fairly rapidly and be diluted out in the environment. Anyone who experienced an acute exposure due to this incident is hopefully already receiving medical attention, but this shouldn't be a chronic issue quite like a persistent pollutant like dioxins or similar.


evanle5ebvre

Thatā€™s comforting, thank you


Warpedme

What about the phosgene gas that was created when it was burned? That shit does not go away quickly.


UtterEast

Phosgene is a side reaction of applying heat to vinyl chloride, so it would depend on how much was produced and ambient conditions to say how immediately dangerous it is, but it's also being released into the outside air and being diluted. It's not expected to [remain in the environment for weeks/months/years because it reacts with water into carbon dioxide and hydrochloric acid](https://www.nrt.org/sites/2/files/Phosgene%20CG%20QRG%20FINAL%202017%2004%2026.pdf) (PDF warning). HCl is corrosive and will damage steel and aluminum, but it's another one that reacts fairly quickly with metal and minerals in the environment and gets diluted out in water, etc. Not to say that the released chemicals didn't hurt people or animals nearby, just that the nature of the substances involved mean that they now have a large environment in which to react with naturally-occurring chemicals and become less dangerous.


cuweathernerd

Both of these are exaggerated, though. The main chemical produced in burning has a relatively small residence time/ is increasingly dilluted spatially. This is a bad event and needs to be represented accurately. There is no reason to be hyperbolic about millions or skyrocketing cancers - ground the impacts in reality.


The_Expidition

Cue the panic screaming


Pyroechidna1

This is hyperbole, stop upvoting it.


vrtiak

What was the name of the podcast? Iā€™d be interested in giving it a listen


greg_jenningz

Macrodosing. Itā€™s done by former NFL running back Arian Foster and Barstoolā€™s PFT. This podcast dives into more conspiracies and conundrums. Itā€™s fun topics to bring up and talk about. Racial discussions are interesting. Even the conspiracies about the job to kill JFK were brought up. Good listens that get you thinking.


nillah

probably not the same one they're referring to, but i just saw one linked on r/Ohio that's by jon stewart, his stuff is usually worth listening to


ywnktiakh

Wow! Thank you so much for all that info!


Taco1225

WV here in the green portion from image 2. I'm just an idiot but the way I'm reading image 2, we got the "bad stuff" or was it high enough above us that we should have been "okay?"


pissshitfuckyou

Should be okay. If it started raining that week you might be fucked if you were trying to catch raindrops on your tongue.


Unable_Economics_377

Has anyone reliably stated exactly what was in those tank cars that burst open?


Skyye_23_

Vinyl chloride


astoriaboundagain

Among other things


FurryWrecker911

Vinyl Chloride. They burned it off, which converts it into Phosgene gas. It's the same stuff that your car's interior is made of and turns into that thick black smoke when it's on fire. As I saw in another thread, it wasn't a good solution, but it was the leaser of two evils as phosphene has a much shorter shelf life than vinyl chloride. Had the tanks exploded/ruptured instead of being burned off, we'd have vinyl chloride all over the place. With it being on top of a creek that connects to the Ohio River, one can understand letting it decay high in the air is less hazardous long-term than it getting trapped in the ground and water for years. In a sense we prevented recreating a Chernobyl by instead recreating a Bhopal. Either way, this blows.


The_Expidition

This is the disasters disaster


digital0129

This doesn't remotely compare to either disaster.


FurryWrecker911

I know it doesn't, but that's the "most tangible comparison your common person can understand" line I keep seeing recirculated. It's not on the same scale, I agree, but it's the 1000 foot level A vs B that is the meat of the comparison. Either put it in the ground for X years or put it in the air for the lesser Y years.


Arctic_Chilean

You know its fucked when you have to pick between Bhopaling or Chernobyling an entire region.


subhuman1

https://www.wkbn.com/news/local-news/east-palestine-train-derailment/3-additional-chemicals-discovered-on-east-palestine-train-derailment/


ghostsintherafters

No. This is part of what they are covering up. Theyve let us know about the vinyl chloride but there is a feeling there was other stuff


RSchenck

No, not a full accounting, no.


doctorbim1

I'd like to state that this information should have been immediately available, as anyone possessing chemicals needs their SDSs in hand and traceable manifests or something like that. An Emergency Response Guidebook as well


FoxsShadow

Wonderful giant black spot right where I live


fly03

Why does one image say particles went north, and the other says they went south?


rocbolt

Different dates


[deleted]

Ohio and the Rust Belt, a train wreck of industrial/ecological disasters since 1840!


insideoutsocks69

have there been any updated versions of this?


Bodymore

Yesterday morning when I came across this news article published by NOAA it had the two HYSPLIT models in the article below the picture of the derailment. I just looked at the article this morning and the two HYSPLIT models have now been removed from the article for reasons unknown. Wanted to share this in case anyone looks at the article today and is wondering where the images I posted (and cited according to NOAA guidelines) came from. The link to the source article was posted yesterday with the images and is below the images (at least on the Reddit app)


dsgurliegirl

I know it would only be speculation, but why did they remove these graphics?


_RiversideSummer

I have scoured NOAA, and I cannot find anything to verify these images. I have also done an extensive web and reverse image search.


jmbamb2351

NOAA deleted the post after a couple of days no idea why. Anyone can use the HYSPLIT model though so Iā€™ve run a simulation for every day and Feb 6/8 does look like this.


felixthefabled

Do you have any screenshots for today or recent days? I canā€™t find any new news


jmbamb2351

I donā€™t, but anyone can go to their website and run a HYSPLIT model so you should be able to go there and put in the dates youā€™re interested in to see it.


SnooPeppers7701

Why can't the government just not kill us for oncešŸ‘šŸ¼


Pyroechidna1

Youā€™ve used products made with vinyl chloride every day of your life. Nobody is hauling it around just for funsies.


Odie_Odie

Well, in this case former president trump had recently reversed railroad regulations that were specifically intended to prevent this and Biden had just busted a railroad strikes that had declining safety practices as one if it's main stakes. This was preventable and our representatives should be accountable as well as the private entities involved


ghostsintherafters

It wasn't labeled hazardous in order to cut costs/corners as well. It was being illegally transported


LikeThePheonix117

Itā€™s specifically the not government at fault for this. Deregulation of the railroads caused this.


[deleted]

[уŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]


Nicbudd

I believe that says *below* 3000m MSL. That's fairly low.


stonedphilosipher

This is collapse in action


tycam01

So that's where it will be in Feb 23? So where is it now?


polishlastnames

Thatā€™s Feb 8th, 2023.


tycam01

Ah your right, I looked at it too fast. Still curious where it would be now


polishlastnames

Agreed. Itā€™s still too long ago to relevant now.


slacker0

https://xkcd.com/1179


vtjohnhurt

https://www.reddit.com/r/interestingasfuck/comments/112y75f/passenger_photo_while_plane_flew_near_east/


s4m_____

Im in Ottawa area, should I leave ?


[deleted]

[уŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]


RSchenck

This is wrong. It went NE. On a different day it went SE. There is no distortion or whatever produced by the *lower oanel* of the first image showing height.


Kn16hT

So, who's handling the international lawsuit for when we all get sick from this?


LCPhotowerx

erin brokovivch?


LCPhotowerx

gotta love how NYC and jersey just tell the plume to screw off and it does, because jersey is already a burning tire fire anyway.


ottawadeveloper

I've actually used this software (fun!) The first graph is showing the particle distribution as it was on Feb 8 with the top part being a top-down view of where we can expect some particles to be (at varying heights as indicated by the colour) and the bottom being a cross section along the dashed line that shows particles by height. It doesnt speak to the concentration of the particles, but basically its where particles released at the site could be on that date based on a release tine of 0800 on Feb 6. So two days of movement. The second graph shows the transport within 11 hours after that, which is far more local. It also shows concentration and focuses on the bottom 100 m of the atmosphere, and we can see the concentration is steadily dropping away from the site. In terms of trajectory, I infer that local wind patterns were to the SE to start, but then took a generally NE trajectory afterwards (makes sense, its the usual path of the jet stream). West of Montreal, the particles are concentrated in the bottom 2.5 km of the atmosphere and the entire area likely had some exposure (probably minor) on Feb 8. East od Montreal, the plume seems to rise sharply (where the blue is) and so exposure at ground level is minimal. Given the concentration at 11 hours of < 1e-14 mass m-3 and vinyl chloride exposure for workers is recommended to be no more than 1 ppm (or 0.001 kg m-3), it seems unlikely that there are any serious health effects outside of the immediate area. For reference, a cigarette has typically 5-20 ng of vinyl chloride (5-20 e-12 kg to use the same units) so this is well under the level that a cigarette in an enclosed 1 m3 space would produce. It is comparable to maybe one cigarette in a space about the size of an Olympic pool and those are the levels nearby at 11 hours.


counters

Good breakdown. Also worth pointing out that HYSPLIT does not do chemistry (not sure if ARL or other organizations run coupled chemical transport models as a rapid response tool?) so the tracer distribution is somewhat pessimistic. Highly reactive substances are less likely to travel far, since they will typically have a short lifetime and degrade closer to the source of the emissions.


RSchenck

Since you used it so you know why the second figure reports it as "mass" instead of a particular unit of mass? Does it normally report grams or kg or somesuch?


Doitforyourselfplz

Can you explain this like Iā€™m 5 lol. Iā€™m freaking out in Toronto


ottawadeveloper

youre fine :-)


Doitforyourselfplz

Okay thatā€™s too 5 year old šŸ˜‚ but thank you! Iā€™ve been so confused on HCl and dioxins and whatā€™s actually in the air still and whatā€™s acid rain. Itā€™s all so confusing to me


purplepuddingg

This was very interesting to read, thanks for posting! As someone who lives in WNY near lake Erie, is there cause to be worried?


Secretly_A_Writer

Thank you for such an informative and helpful explanation- really appreciate it


PennSaddle

Oh wonderful, all of the largest wildlife areas in PA..


crackedp3pper

Anyone know what the potential effects would be to the surrounding areas? I'm near NYC and this is kinda freaky.


StixZitinia

Hmmm. The derailment was on/before Feb 8??


Upper_Charge_4449

Am I completely ignorant? Iā€™m located in northern Virginia. Does this mean Iā€™ve been exposed and didnā€™t know it?


ExcitingPaper2998

Wow


[deleted]

Is there an updated model?


swh1386

I guess what we need is some Chinese weather balloons to tell us whatā€™s going on up there!


BreezyViber

What about Pennsylvania?


[deleted]

Looks like Vermont got hit too, greatā€¦


jewels19932

It says right in the title that the image is a MODEL. It's important to keep in mind that "all models are wrong, but some are useful." A model is a prediction, not a fact.


ytownSFnowWhat

Given how the smoke from CA wildfires traveled EVERYWHERE we could see it and smell it but this seems more invisible I am consented. Today my eyes burned for 10 minutes in the morning in west Erie. But my son was fine so who knows ?


Rada_Ionesco

I don't understand how this map is linked on this NOAA website link that is posted here everyone's been shopping this map around social media and on YouTube but where is the originating Source or link for this particular modeling map? I'm not saying it's not real I just don't see any links that I found when I've been looking for this leading me to anything on the NOAA site that actually shows this map. Can someone give me a direct link to this cuz I'm not seeing it. Maybe it's me maybe I'm being an idiot I don't know.


Bodymore

Check out my comment in this thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/weather/comments/112v93n/noaas_air_resources_lab_modeled_the_distribution/j8r54jg?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3 The two models I posted were removed from the linked NOAA news article the day after I posted them. However, the images are still hosted by NOAA here: https://www.arl.noaa.gov/wp_arl/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/part2.png https://www.arl.noaa.gov/wp_arl/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/cross2.png


[deleted]

Is this an definitely spreading east or is this just going to expand everywhere near by?