By Bill Lucia | Editor
With nine people still missing after Tuesday’s chemical tank blast in Longview, first responders indicated that they did not expect to find more survivors at the site. The confirmed death toll climbed to two Wednesday, as one person rescued the day before died. Seven other employees and one firefighter were also injured. “We declared this incident a transition from rescue to recovery as of this morning,” Cowlitz 2 Fire and Rescue Chief Scott Goldstein said yesterday.
Also in today’s edition…
A judge sides with Washington in a dispute over funding for immigrant services.
A Pacific Northwest amphibian may soon gain endangered species protections.
And, the Supreme Court declines to expedite a Washington redistricting case.
News tips, feedback, questions? Email us: [email protected]
Community members comfort each other during a vigil at R.A. Long Park following the fatal chemical storage tank failure in Longview. (Photo by Mathieu Lewis-Rolland/Getty Images)
By Bill Lucia and Jake Goldstein-Street
The chemical tank accident happened on Tuesday morning. A tank holding more than half a million gallons of a corrosive substance known as white liquor erupted at the Nippon Dynawave Packaging plant. White liquor is used in paper manufacturing. It can cause severe burns upon contact with skin.
“We’re bracing ourselves for this being the deadliest industrial tragedy in modern Washington state history,” said Gov. Bob Ferguson.
Some of the chemical flowed into the nearby Columbia River and into a local diking system, state and local officials said Wednesday. Officials continued to say yesterday that the air quality around the site and local drinking water remain safe. It was unclear as of yesterday afternoon how much of the chemical went into the river.
Goldstein said earlier estimates of how much white liquor the tank held at the time of the incident were too high, and that the actual amount was around 600,000 gallons. About 25,000 gallons were still in the damaged tank around midday yesterday.
By Jake Goldstein-Street
A federal judge in Seattle earlier this week ruled the Trump administration wrongfully terminated a $4 million grant for Washington meant to provide services for new migrants. The case deals with money withheld under the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE — the project Elon Musk led early in Trump’s term to slash government spending.
The grant was for a Washington program to help cover costs of shelter, access to food, water, medical care and hygiene supplies for newly arrived immigrants, many seeking asylum and other humanitarian relief.
U.S. District Court Judge Barbara Rothstein said the Trump administration’s cancellation of the funding was “arbitrary and capricious.” Rothstein’s order restores the state’s ability to submit requests for federal reimbursements, but doesn’t force the Federal Emergency Management Agency to approve them.
The Crater Lake newt. (Photo courtesy of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife)
By Alex Baumhardt
An imperiled newt only found in and around southern Oregon’s Crater Lake may soon be protected under the Endangered Species Act following a three-year legal battle. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agreed in a recent settlement with the Center for Biological Diversity to decide by October whether to list the Crater Lake newt, also known as the Mazama newt, on the federal endangered list and to invest in its survival. The yellow and dark orange newts are a subspecies of rough-skinned newt.
Up until about 150 years ago, the newts lacked predators. But in the late 1800s, fish were introduced to Crater Lake to attract visitors, and decades later, managers of what would become by 1902 Crater Lake National Park introduced crayfish as food for the lake’s burgeoning fish population. Both the fish and the crayfish prey on the newts. And as lake temperatures have warmed in recent decades due to climate change, the population of crayfish in and along the lake has exploded.
US Supreme Court won’t expedite WA redistricting case
The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected a request to speed up consideration of a challenge to Washington’s legislative district boundaries. Lawyers for Jose Trevino and state Rep. Alex Ybarra, R-Quincy, submitted their request on May 15. It followed the high court’s ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, which significantly curtailed the use of race in drawing districts. Trevino and Ybarra’s attorneys argued that without quick intervention by the court, this year’s elections in Washington could take place under a district map that’s impermissible based on Callais. The case centers on a redrawn legislative district map that U.S. District Court Judge Robert Lasnik approved in 2024 to enhance the political voice of Latino voters in the Yakima Valley. The Supreme Court still hasn’t decided whether to take the case. At this point, there’s a June 2 deadline for the different sides to submit briefs arguing why it should or should not proceed.
ICYMI
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