Too often in past disasters like last year's fiery
First responders need to know exactly which hazardous materials are on a train so they can look it up in the government's official guidebook and make sure they have the right protective gear and firefighting tools, said
Knowing what chemical is involved and how much of it is aboard also affects how big of an evacuation zone might be required to protect the public.
“There are so many different types of hazardous materials being transported across the country on any given day — one in 10 goods that move across
The rule was published just one day ahead of the
Train crews have long carried lists of their cargo in the cabs of their locomotives, but in the middle of the chaos after a derailment those engineers and conductors, who might have moved their locomotives miles down the track, can't always be found right away.
That's part of why the largest freight railroads developed an app called AskRail roughly a decade ago that enables firefighters to quickly look up the details of what each train carries. But not every firefighter had the app, and cell phones don't always have a signal strong enough to work in a disaster.
Regulators want the railroads to continue expanding access to that app, including to 911 centers, so information reaches first responders sooner. The railroads have been expanding access over the past year.
The six biggest railroads also make train cargo information immediately available through the chemical industry's hazardous materials hotlines in the
But the new federal rule also applies to the hundreds of smaller railroads that aren't involved in AskRail. Even railroads that only have one or two employees now must have a plan to get the crucial details of their cargo to the local fire department quickly, even if its as simple as having the fire chief's cell phone number at the ready. Railroads also must test their plan at least once a year.
“In a hazmat incident, firefighters and first responders arriving on scene need to know what kind of hazardous materials are present so they can protect themselves and their communities,”
It's not clear how this rule might have changed the outcome in
The derailment prompted a nationwide reckoning over railroad safety and prompted
The
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