As residents continue to wait for action in Washington D.C., hundreds of East Palestine, Ohio residents are gearing up for a new court battle. A new lawsuit claims that Norfolk Southern and agencies at all levels of government failed the communities in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

On Feb. 3, 2023, a Norfolk Southern freight train carrying hazardous materials derailed after a railcar's wheel bearing overheated, causing a fire. Three days later, officials conducted a "controlled release" of several tank cars that were filled with vinyl chloride, a toxic and flammable gas that can cause certain cancers, to prevent an explosion.

Two years after the derailment, researchers are stepping in to track how low-level, long-term environmental exposures are affecting the health of East Palestine residents.

We are in it for the long haul in East Palestine,” Vance, a former US senator from Ohio, said in remarks from the town’s fire station.

Vice President JD Vance, his wife and multiple officials are visiting the small Ohio village on its two-year anniversary of the toxic Norfolk Southern train derailment.

A lawsuit alleging for the first time that people died because of the disastrous 2023 East Palestine train derailment has been filed ahead of Monday’s second anniversary of the toxic crash near the Ohio-Pennsylvania border amid a flurry of new litigation.