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A chemical leak on a derailed CSX train has been contained, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowswer said Sunday morning.
The CSX train derailed Sunday morning in Northeast Washington; 13 cars of the 175- car train left the tracks. No one was injured, Bowser said at a mid-morning news conference.
At a joint news conference with D.C. Fire and EMS Deputy Chief John Donnelly, Bowser said officials were working to clear up the scene and resume train service along the corridor, which is shared by CSX, Amtrak and MARC trains. She did not say when the tracks were expected to reopen.
Metro personnel were inspecting a portion of its tracks near the derailment and train service would resume “as soon as those inspections are complete,” she said. Officials described the chemical as similar to bleach or Drano.
Donnelly said the leak was contained, but could not immediately say how much of the chemical had spilled.
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“The fumes should not cause you any problems and you should not be able to smell them anywhere else,” Donnelly said.
Bowser said residents who haven’t been able to get back into their homes will be able to “shortly,” though she didn’t give an exact time.
She said the Federal Railroad Administration was investigating.
Rhode Island Avenue is closed to traffic from Fourth to 10th streets, and the Rhode Island Avenue Metro station was shut. Red Line service is suspended between the NoMa-Gallaudet and Brookland stations.
CSX said the derailment occurred about 6:40 a.m. as a train was traveling from Cumberland, Md., to Hamlet, N.C. The derailment occurred near 9th street and Rhode Island Avenue NE, CSX said.
Of the train’s 175 cars, 94 were carrying mixed freight and 81 were empty. One of the derailed cars was leaking sodium hydroxide, which CSX described as “used to produce various household products, including paper, soap and detergents.”
“We are grateful for the swift response from Washington, D.C., first responders and other agencies,” CSX said.
Alaina Higgin, 22, of Northwest, was heading to work Sunday at Twist It Sista hair salon when her bus was forced to stop at 400 Rhode Island Ave. Higgin, who got on that bus at 100 K St. NW, had to wait at a nearby McDonald’s for her boss to come get her and take both of them to work. She was supposed to exit at the Rhode Island bus stop.
No one on the bus knew why they were forced to disembark before their scheduled stops.
“I wish there was better communication with the buses and the drivers, so they could say, ‘Hey,’ and let us know,” she said. “I had no idea what was going on until I got over here. I’m like, ‘What the heck is going on?’ ”
Marina Shalabi, 24, was having trouble getting to church amid the road closures. Shalabi, who lives near Gallaudet University, was headed to Sunday Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception but had spent the past hour navigating the Metro rail closure and bus detours.
About 9:30 a.m, she said, the P6 bus dropped off her and more than a dozen other passengers at Fourth Street and Rhode Island Avenue, the driver telling them that the route would end there.
“Everyone was confused,” she said. “Everyone was asking questions.”
Around 10 a.m., she decided to make the mile-long trip on foot.
Cartrell Carter was heading to a Narcotics Anonymous meeting at the Metropolis Club at 938 Rhode Island Ave. at 10:30 a.m. but was forced to change plans after he had to exit his bus.
Carter, who has been clean for seven years and attends meetings twice a week, decided instead to go to a meeting at Howard University Hospital at 11:00 a.m. “I had a backup plan,” he said.
He said the bus driver told the passengers that there was a chemical leak, and police at the scene confirmed the news.
Ashley Halsey III contributed to this report.
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