Norfolk Southern class action claims derailment caused property values to decrease

Norfolk Southern derailment class action lawsuit overview: 

• Who: A group of Ohio residents have filed a class action lawsuit against Norfolk Southern Corporation and Norfolk Southern Railway Company.  
• Why: Ohio residents claim Norfolk Southern bears responsibility for a Feb. 3 train derailment they argue has contaminated the area of East Palestine, Ohio and decreased their property values.
• Where: The class action lawsuit was filed in Ohio federal court.

A Norfolk Southern train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio earlier this month contaminated the area with millions of pounds of hazardous chemicals into the local water, soil, and air, a new class action lawsuit alleges. 

A group of Ohio residents claim Norfolk Southern bears responsibility for the Feb. 3 train derailment, which they argue has led to a decrease in their property values and caused them mental and physical damages.

Ohio residents claim Norfolk Southern further exacerbated the incident by diverting vinyl chloride being carried by the train into a “hastily excavated trench” and setting the cancer-causing gas on fire. 

“The fire raged for days, covering local properties in a large plume of thick black smoke and dispersing toxic chemicals for miles” the Norfolk Southern class action states. 

Fire from the smoke, meanwhile, billowed into neighborhoods where thousands of residents lived and worked, while causing “widespread anxiety, panic, and fear about potentially dire health consequences,” according to the Norfolk Southern class action. 

Ohio residents want to represent a residential property class of individuals who resided in, leased, or owned a property within a 30-mile radius of the derailment site as of Feb. 3, and a business class of individuals who owned and operated a business, commercial property, or farmland, with the same stipulations. 

Norfolk Southern caused ‘toxic plume’ that poisoned livestock, crops, shut down businesses, forced evacuations, says suit

The “toxic plume” from the fire, meanwhile, “poisoned livestock and crops, and shut down local businesses as residents either evacuated or stayed locked inside their homes,” the Norfolk Southern class action alleges. 

Ohio residents claim they are still experiencing the detrimental effects — including contaminated groundwater — from the train derailment, and that their property values have suffered and continue to suffer. 

“These properties have suffered and continue to suffer a diminution in value by virtue of their proximity to site of the trainwreck, and the stigma associated with being located so near the environmental disaster,” the Norfolk Southern class action states. 

Ohio residents claim Norfolk Southern is guilty of wanton and willful misconduct, statutory, public, and private nuisance, trespass, and negligence, among other things, and of violating an Ohio code regarding inducing panic. 

Plaintiffs are demanding a jury trial and requesting injunctive and declaratory relief along with an award of compensatory, statutory, and punitive damages for themselves and all class members. 

A similar class action lawsuit was filed against Norfolk Southern earlier this month by a pair of individuals claiming the transport company was responsible for the train derailment. 

Have you been impacted by the Norfolk Southern train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio? Let us know in the comments! 

The plaintiffs are represented by  Ashlie Case Sletvold and Kevin P. Conway of Peiffer Wolf Carr Kane Conway & Wise LLP, David P. Meyer and Matthew R. Wilson of Meyer Wilson Co. LPA, and Robert J. Nelson, Lexi J. Hazam, Patrick I. Andrews, Jonathan D. Selbin, and Wilson M. Dunlavey of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP. 

The Norfolk Southern derailment class action lawsuit is Baker, et al. v. Norfolk Southern Corporation, et al., Case No. 4:23-cv-00324, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio. 

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