A FREIGHT TRAIN NAMED HYSTERIA

[Center for Public Environmental Oversight <cpeo@cpeo.org>]

This is from yesterdays Chicago Tribune.

A FREIGHT TRAIN NAMED HYSTERIA

It was a golden opportunity for Chicago-area public officials to do
what they get paid to do--lead.

Instead, every one of them--from village officials in suburban
Frankfort all the way to U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Carol
Moseley-Braun--stampeded to the nearest TV camera to join in a chorus
of Chicken Little-style hand-wringing over the Navy's plans to bring
napalm from California to be recycled at an East Chicago plant.

As a result, they kept a perfectly sensible disposal and recycling
operation from taking place and covered themselves in disgrace at the
same time. Save some blame, also, for the news media, who forfeited
the chance to be voices of reason during this episode.

Napalm, of course, summons up fearsome images in the minds of
Americans, who naturally associate it with the awesome destruction
that American napalm bombs inflicted in Vietnam during the war there.

Problem is, what was being shipped to Pollution Control Industries in
northern Indiana were not bombs, which require high-temperature
igniters to set off the vaporized napalm upon impact with the ground.
It was just the napalm, a mixture of benzene and gasoline with 46
percent inert binder to give it a molasses-like consistency. It's
flammable, but not explosive like the gasoline in tanker trucks that
rumble down city streets daily.

Yes, there was a chance of an accident, but a minuscule chance. Our
"leaders" could have inquired, informed and generally led a
rational--and calming--discussion on the matter. The news media, for
our parts, could have explained the true, modest nature of the risk,
rather than simply passing along the politicians' hysterical rantings.

Instead, everyone chose to choreograph a public panic. Now we have a
train with napalm stranded in Kansas, tons of the stuff still piled up
back in California and some politicians suggesting that it all be
shipped to an atoll in the South Pacific. Needless to say, this has not
been
our finest hour.