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Canton Cleans Up After Two Industrial Spills

Plain Township fire station
Plain Township.org
Plain Township fire station

There were two industrial spills in four hours on the east side of Canton this week.  The unrelated accidents on Tuesday were in a rail center and at a poultry processing plant. 

Plain Township fire station
Credit Plain Township.org
/
Plain Township.org
Plain Township fire station

Shortly after noon, a couple of tank cars in the Norfolk Southern switching yard collided. Tripropylene, a chemical used in coatings and lubricants, began leaking from one. Plain Township Fire and Rescue responded. 

Chief Charles Shalenberger says, “We called the Stark County Hazmat Team to assist us, along with the Marathon Oil Refinery foam truck to help us with some foam application. Vapors were suppressed so we didn’t have to evacuate anybody. But there is cleanup still going on at that facility.”

At about 4:30, the city of Canton’s Fire Department was called to the Case Farms plant two miles from the Norfolk  Southern site, after a truck backed into a 300-gallon tank of acid and caused a leak. That, too, was contained with only minor damage. 

There were no injuries in either incident and both were reported to the Ohio EPA.

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Tim Rudell
Tim Rudell has worked in broadcasting and news since his student days at Kent State in the late 1960s and early 1970s (when he earned extra money as a stringer for UPI). He began full time in radio news in 1972 in his home town of Canton, OH.