At Risk, In The Dark

As the Mariner East pipelines become a permanent underpinning of Pennsylvania, secrecy and a patchwork of emergency plans have left many communities in the dark about what to do in case of an accident.

Tim Boyce — the emergency manager in Delaware County, where the Mariner East pipelines cut through a population of roughly 3,000 people per square mile — said planners like himself need more information from Sunoco. “You can’t just keep telling people, ‘It’s OK, don’t worry about it.’ We owe it to them to have thought this through beforehand,” he said.
Michael Bryant / Philadelphia Inquirer

A yearlong investigation chronicling one of the most controversial infrastructure projects in Pennsylvania’s history. Investigative Reporter Rebecca Moss traveled the length of the Mariner East pipeline system in Pennsylvania. Along the route, she interviewed dozens of people whose homes, schools, and communities of worship were feet from the pipeline to learn about what they knew and how they had been informed — or not informed — about how to handle a potential emergency. In total, Moss conducted more than 80 interviews and reviewed hundreds of pages of documents from case records, state violation records, planning documents, federal data, and incident reports.

Support Spotlight PA's vital investigative journalism for Pennsylvania and for a limited time, your gift will be DOUBLED.