COLUMBUS, Mont. Preliminary water and air quality tests along a stretch of the Yellowstone River where train cars carrying hazardous commodities crashed into the stream after a bridge collapse revealed no danger to the public, state and federal officials said on Sunday.
A day after the bridge collapsed at Columbus, Montana, roughly 40 miles (64 kilometers) west of Billings, seven damaged automobiles carrying hot asphalt and molten sulfur remained in the rushing river. The place is in a remote part of the Yellowstone River Valley, surrounded by ranch and farmland.
According to Kevin Stone, a Montana Department of Environmental Quality representative, preliminary water quality sampling results did not reveal petroleum hydrocarbons or sulfur, which would have originated from the asphalt. He explained that neither of them dissolved in water.
“Water quality testing will continue until the cleanup is completed, and at this time there are no known risks to public drinking water,” he stated.
According to Stone, the water testing is being carried out by contractors for the train’s operator, Montana Rail Link, with oversight from the Montana Department of Environmental Quality and the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
Meanwhile, contractors testing the air downwind of the derailment for the EPA have found no harmful chemicals, said Rich Mylott, a regional office spokesperson.
Water testing began Saturday and will continue throughout the cleaning of the crash site, according to Montana Rail Link spokeswoman Andy Garland.
Preliminary water and air quality tests along a stretch of the Yellowstone River where train cars carrying hazardous commodities crashed into the stream.
“Montana Rail Link remains committed to addressing any potential impacts to the area as a result of this incident,” he added.
According to David Stamey, the head of Stillwater County Disaster and Emergency Services, the number of goods spilled from the automobiles in the river is yet unknown.
Both hot asphalt and molten sulfur harden and solidify quickly when mixed with water, according to Garland, and modeling indicates that the chemicals are unlikely to flow very far downstream.
According to Stamey, crews were still figuring out the best approach to remove the cars because the crash was so significant and there was so much damage to them.
The Federal Railroad Administration was investigating the cause of the incident, but spokeswoman Daniel Gryphon said there was no preliminary information about the investigation to disclose.
According to Global Net, the bridge collapse also destroyed a fiber-optic cable that provided internet connectivity to numerous consumers in the state. It was still delivering service via a backup route on Sunday, but some users were without service or suffering very poor connections, according to a recorded update on its phone line.
In 2022, Yellowstone experienced unprecedented floods, causing major damage to Yellowstone National Park and neighboring towns in Montana. The river where the bridge collapsed is about 110 miles (177 km) southwest of Yellowstone National Park.
According to Robert Bea, a retired engineering professor at the University of California Berkeley who has studied the origins of hundreds of significant disasters, repeated years of excessive river flows provided a hint as to the possible reason.
SOURCE – (AP)
