Short Takes – 8-29-26 - Federal Register Edition

Hurricane Safety  

Safety Zone; Hurricanes, Tropical Storms, and Severe Weather Events in the Sector Mobile Captain of the Port Zone. CG final rule. Summary: “The Coast Guard is establishing a safety zone in the navigable waters within the Sector Mobile Captain of the Port (COTP) zone, to be enforced in the event of hurricanes, tropical storms, and other severe weather events. This regulation establishes requirements for industry and vessel operators in the Mobile COTP zone, to ensure the safety of the ports and waters within the zone prior to, during and immediately following these events.” 

Space Geek  

Name of Information Collection: NASA To Research, Evaluate, Assess, and Treat (TREAT) Astronauts Act. NASA 30-day ICR renewal notice. Summary: “Under this authority, NASA collects health-related information from former astronauts and former payload specialists to provide medical evaluation and treatment for conditions associated with human spaceflight. This ongoing information collection supports clinical care and contributes to a comprehensive knowledge base on the long-term effects of spaceflight. It also enables NASA to identify gaps in services that support medical monitoring, diagnosis, and treatment of spaceflight-associated conditions. Records are collected by authorized healthcare providers within the JSC Occupational Health Branch.” 

Executive Order  

EO 14421 - Declaring a National Emergency to Secure the United States Bulk-Power System. 

Deregulation  

FRA Final Rules. The DOT’s Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) published 10 final rules in Monday’s (available online today) Federal Register. All ten of these rules may be classified as ‘deregulatory’ under the requirements of §3(a) of EO 14192. None of the final rules are of specific interest here. They include:  

• Permitting Use of Computer-Based, Three-Dimensional Simulation for Periodic Refresher Training on Brake Systems, 
• Miscellaneous Amendments to FRA's Accident Reporting Regulations, 
• Expanding Certain Locomotive Wheel Set Diameter Variations, 
• Retiring Form FRA F 6180.107 and Form FRA F 6180.150, 
• Repealing Outdated Railroad Workplace Safety Requirements and Making Other Improvements, 
• Repealing Special Approval Requirement for Freight Cars More Than 50 Years Old, 
• Enhancing Railroad Discretion in Sounding Locomotive Horns at Passenger Stations, 
• Amendments to Brake System Maintenance and Inspection Requirements, 
• Regulatory Relief From Locomotive Horn Sounding Pattern at Public Highway-Rail Grade Crossings, and 
• Regulatory Relief for End of Car Cushioning Units.

FRA Sends Electric Brake Final Rule to OMB

Yesterday, the OMB’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) announced that it had received a final rule from the DOT’s Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) on “Amendments to Brake System Safety Standards Governing Operations Using Electronic Air Brake Slip System”. The notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) for this rulemaking was published on January 15th, 2021.  

According to the 2026 Unified Agenda entry for this rulemaking: 

“This rulemaking proposes to amend FRA's brake system safety standards to govern operations using the eABS system developed by AAR member railroads. This rulemaking would provide an alternative regulatory framework for railroads to utilize when choosing to use the eABS system. The rulemaking would extend the distance individual rail cars may be moved without stopping for brake and mechanical inspections and tests if the cars have a valid eABS system record. The rulemaking also proposes to allow railroads to add multiple cars to a train or remove multiple cars from a train without conducting additional brake tests as currently required if the train is solely made up of cars with eABS records.” 

This final rule looks to be a bit more on the technical side of railroad operations that I typically cover in this blog. I do not expect to cover this in any detail, but I do plan on at least announcing its publication in the appropriate Short Takes post. 

Looking Back – 3-4-11 – Unusual Order Reporting

Nearly every morning I start my computer time by looking at information from Google about what happened in my blog in the previous 24 hours. Google, and blogspot.com is a Google service, provides interesting pieces of analytical data about my blog readership. One item of particular interest is the top ten blog posts each day. As you would expect, most of those posts were from the last couple of days, but with 16 years of publishing this blog, every once-in-a-while, a blog post from ancient history rises into that list. 

Today a blog post from March 2011 showed up on the list, “Unusual Order Reporting”. That post looked at a series of news stories about the preemption of a potential terrorist attack because of the reporting by both a chemical supply company and a transportation company about an order for a chemical by someone out of the ordinary; a chemical that can be used to make improvised explosive devices. 

Much of the discussion in the piece deals with the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) program requirements for knowing your customers, especially when shipping chemical weapons, explosives, and precursors to both. While the shipping both chemical weapons and explosives remain regulated, with the death of the CFATS program in 2023, the regulation of precursor chemicals has disappeared from the federal arsenal. 

While I expect that most reputable chemical companies and distributors, especially those that were in the CFATS program, do make an honest effort to know their customers (and all the major industrial chemical organizations have programs that emphasize such efforts), such efforts cost time and money, and lose potential customers; corner cutting would not be unexpected. And, unfortunately, we do not have to look far (see yesterday’s post about this week’s CSB update) examples of chemical companies cutting major corners. 

CFATS is dead and buried. Someone is going to have to seriously think about what is going to cover the chemical security bases such as how to keep chemical weapon and improvised explosive precursors out of the hands of potential terrorists. 

CSB Publishes Update for Dynawave Tank Failure Investigation

Yesterday, the Chemical Safety Board announced the publication of an update on their investigation of the May 26th, 2026, fatal white liquor release at the Nippon Dynawave Packaging Facility in Longview, WA. That incident killed 11 employees and seriously injured three other employees. CSB announced their investigation of the incident the following day. 

The update published today provided background information on the facility, a description of the pulp process that produced and used the white liquor stored in the failed tank, and a brief overview of the incident timeline. The ongoing investigation is concentrating on:  

• Inspecting G Tank and determining the failure mode and cause(s) of the tank failure; 
• NDP’s mechanical integrity policies and practices; 
• NDP’s actions to inspect, repair, and/or replace G Tank and other atmospheric storage tanks; 
• NDP’s policies and practices to manage change; 
• NDP’s capital project management policies and practices; 
• NDP’s emergency response policies and procedures; 
• NDP’s hazard evaluation policies and procedures; and 
• Regulatory requirements and industry guidance for paper mills.