Norfolk Southern’s CEO is offering support for some parts of a bipartisan U.S. Senate bill to put tougher safety regulations on railroads after last month’s fiery hazardous materials train derailment on the Ohio-Pennsylvania border.
CEO Alan Shaw is under pressure from senators and federal safety regulators to step up his commitment to safety regulations as he appears before the Senate Commerce Committee on Wednesday. Under aggressive questioning from senators earlier this month in a separate hearing, he committed to voluntary safety upgrades and earnestly apologized for the derailment that upended life in East Palestine, Ohio. But Shaw had stopped short of endorsing proposed safety regulations under the Railway Safety Act of 2023.
This time, Shaw says in prepared remarks released Tuesday that the Atlanta-based Norfolk Southern will “support legislative efforts to enhance the safety of the freight rail industry.” But he does not address several key provisions of the Railway Safety Act, including increased fines for safety violations and designating trains that carry flammable gas as highly hazardous.
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