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An
unusual substance brought business to a standstill at a Louisa County
truck stop Tuesday night. Hazmat crews responded around 6 p.m. to the
scene of a spill at the CITGO truck just off Interstate 64 at Zion
Crossroads.
Hazmat crews were called in from Charlottesville
to try and figure out exactly what they found. The parking lot was
evacuated and drivers stranded.
A lieutenant with Louisa
County Fire and EMS says a truck driver was returning to his cab after
fueling up and found the leak. The unidentified corrosive managed to
seep out of a metal barrel and eat through the bed of the truck. The lot
behind the CITGO serves as a rest stop and scale station for long
distance drivers but it was roped off starting at 6 pm.
"Anytime
we have a tractor trailer that's placard, dangerous, or flammable, we've
got to take out precautions to clear out the area," explained Delbert
Feaster with Louisa Fire and EMS. "Just because we don't know how much
cargo is in that truck or what he's hauling."
"I don't
think it should be taped off the way it's taped off, and holding
everybody else up," said Trucker Junior Syrkes. "You've got 50 to 60
trucks out here for something where nobody knows what's going
on."
Witnesses say the truck driver met with investigators,
but there is no word on where he is from or where his cargo is
heade
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HARRISON TWP., Pa. --
Allegheny County Hazmat crews were called to a home along Pine Street in
Harrison Township Monday night.
Officials
said a man in the house was overcome by fumes while he was mixing pool
chemicals with bleach.
Emergency
workers told Channel 11 this is the fourth similar call they have
received during this pool season.
"Ironically, this is the fourth call that our hazardous
materials team has responded to this pool season. We're strongly urging
residents to follow the recommended directions of the manufacturer of
the chemicals to properly put the chemicals in the pool. You should not
be premixing your chemicals. Most of the manufacturers recommend
directly applying the chemicals to the pool itself," said Alvin
Henderson of Allegheny County EMS.
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A HazMat
team monitored and vented a house at 57 St. Mary's Road yesterday after
a paint remover apparently reacted with carbon monoxide, sending four
people to Milton Hospital.
Milton Fire Chief John Grant said a concrete cause of
the vapors that overtook one worker and caused another to feel ill on
Monday has not been determined, but it appears that a chemical in the
Strip-Ease they were using reacted with carbon
monoxide.
The vapors in the home also sent the homeowner and a
responding police officer to the hospital. According to Grant those
individuals were treated and released.
The
conditions of the two workers were not available, but Grant said the
worker who was overcome by the fumes suffered chemical burns and was
transported to Mass General.
The Milton Fire Department and HazMat team used fans
to air out the property while monitoring vapor levels. HazMat left the
scene after 3:30 p.m. once the levels dropped below IDLH (Immediately
Dangerous to Life or Health) concentrations.
Two
firefighters remained at the home to continue to vent and secure the
property. Grant said the homeowners are still not permitted in the home.
The contractor who employs the two injured workers will hire an
environmental cleanup company to secure the home.
OSHA is
also conducting an investigation to determine if the incident was caused
by negligence.
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SOUTH MILWAUKEE - A Milwaukee emergency hazmat team
has arrived at a Milwaukee County Pool in South Milwaukee to
handle a hazmat situation.
A South Milwaukee Fire Department official tells
Newsradio 620 WTMJ that the situation started at about 10:10 a.m. with a
report of a smoke from a nearby building.
Fire
crews arrived at the scene and discovered that the building had a
flooded basement and an electrical problem on site.
We
Energies crews then arrived at the scene to shut down the power to the
area, and they discovered that chemicals used at Grobschmidt Pool had
spilled.
Two chemicals had been released because of the spill,
and Milwaukee hazmat teams were called to the
area.
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Emergency crews responded to a mass casualty
incident in Tualatin this morning. At 8:22am, employees at ACS, located
at 18277 SW Boones Ferry Rd, called 911 complaining of respiritory
problems and nausea. The building was quickly
evacuated.
Firefighters arrived to find
more than 100 people outside the building, more than 20 of whom
complained of respiratory symptoms including burning noses, coughing and
watery eyes. Firefighters quickly declared a Mass Casualty Incident and
called for more resources as they began assessing employees for
injuries. Firefighters determined that 12 patients should be transported
to local hospitals.
As
additional resources arrived from around the southwest suburbs,
firefighters made entry into the building and located the source of the
problem. TVF&R has determined that a computer backup system=92s
battery (about the size of a car battery) boiled over and the sulfuric
acid particulates spread into some areas of the building. Firefighters
removed the battery and used HazMat monitors to check the air and ensure
that the building was safe to re-enter. At no time during the incident
was there a danger to any of the surrounding community and no additional
evacuations were necessary. TVF&R advised ACS managers that the
building was safe to occupy three hours after arriving
on-scene.
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EUGENE, Ore. - The first employee to arrive at the
offices of the Feynman Group found a newspaper box with a yellow
substance in it Tuesday morning.
Not thinking much of it, the
employee dumped the yellow stuff out.
Then he
found more of the stuff near the front door, and even more near a
roll-up door.
Then he smelled an odor and called
police.
That employee was taken to the hospital for evaluation
as a precaution, Sgt. Eric Klinko with the Eugene Police Department
said.
"He suffered some form of exposure to this chemical,"
Klinko said.
Reporters from KATU's sister station in Eugene, KVAL,
have since learned that the man is OK. They spoke with him about what
happened.
"It was giving off a little bit of an odor and it was
kind of smoking," the man told KVAL News. "I thought the sun was causing
that. But as I looked in closer, I took a big whiff of it and felt
lightheaded, kind of dizzy. I thought maybe I was going to pass
out."
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Fire crews and a Hazmat team
were called out to the Flying Horse County Club in Colorado Springs on
Wednesday night after a lifeguard noticed an acid spill in a swimming
pool pump room.
He called for help around 8 p.m. Wednesday from the
rec center at the country club, at 1880 Weiskopf Pt on the northeast
side of the Springs, off of Highway 83.
No one was injured by the spill. The leak came from a
hydrochloric acid pump that helps balance the pH levels in the kids
swimming pool at the center. 80 gallons were spilled from a 100-gallon
barrel of acid, but the dangerous chemical was all contained in a fluid
trap. That large amount leaked out over several hours, and it took
Hazmat several hours clean up the danger and neutralize the acid with
baking soda.
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Staff were evacuated from an industrial laundry after
a chemical spillage in Staffordshire.
Peroxides, acids and alkalines are thought to have been
deliberately mixed together at Central Laundry in
Burton-upon-Trent.
They spilled into the yard, a nearby road, footpaths
and approximately 3,000 litres seeped into the drains.
Firefighters spent several hours clearing the scene before
the all-clear was given at 0300 BST on Monday.
Seven
crews from Burton, Barton-Under-Needwood, Chase Terrace, Lichfield and
the Damage Limitation Unit from Hanley attended the
scene.
Medical treatment
Firefighters wore breathing apparatus and gas-tight suits to
clean up the spillage.
Eight workers at Central Laundry, which provides linen
services to the healthcare, hospitality and education sectors, were also
evacuated from the site and received medical treatment at the
scene.
Paul Cullen, Assistant Area Commander for East
Staffordshire, said: "The chemicals were mixing together and releasing
hydrogen gas, which is extremely flammable.
"We used
gas monitors to ensure it had evaporated before leaving the scene, as
our main priority was to make certain there was no risk to the
public."
Mr Cullen said the mixed chemicals posed no threat to
the public although some people may be able to smell perfume or a
bleach-type of aroma from some drains.
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All of a weak solvent commonly used in semiconductor
manufacturing was recovered after a 55-gallon drum spilled around 4 p.m.
Friday, June 18, at the local semiconductor manufacturing facility of
Microchip Technology Inc. on 21015 S.E. Stark Street.
=93Microchip's containment-trench safety systems completely
contained the leak, and all of the solvent was subsequently recovered
during the clean up,=94 said Lawson.
There were no injuries,
chemical exposures or any other kind of damage, according to
Lawson.
The Gresham Fire Department responded to the call of
Microchip's Emergency Response Team because of the flammable nature of
the edge bead removal solvent.
Hazmat also responded to the
call to mitigate the problem.
The storage room where the spill occurred is sealed
and equipped with both containment trenches and fire
sprinklers.
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MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - Shoppers turning up at Montgomery's
Eastdale Mall on Father's Day were turned away by police after a
refrigerant leak and the death of a worker were
reported.
Officers had blocked off every entrance of the mall,
while the Montgomery Fire Department's HAZMAT team tried to find the
source of an R-22 refrigerant leak near the mall's ice skating
rink.
Lt. Mark Drinkard, a spokesman for the Montgomery
Police Department, says the fire department received a call Sunday
morning about the leak, and police received a call reporting a man was
dead.
Drinkard says 22-year-old Nicholas Burdette of
Millbrook apparently was performing janitorial services when he
died.
Drinkard says Burdette's cause of death won't not be
known until an autopsy is performed.
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The fire broke out in a science block at Kambrya
College, Berwick, in Melbourne's southeast.
A
specialist Hazmat unit was called to the scene due to concerns about
chemicals in the portable classrooms.
...
CFA spokeswoman Andrea Brown said in the latest
Berwick incident, callers initially reported explosions, believed to be
from gas cylinders.
Fourteen trucks responded to the blaze after nearby
residents raised the alarm about 9.45pm.
The fire
affected six portables, four of which were destroyed.
"It was
quite a significant fire, the first units saw plumes of smoke and large
flames as they were mobile,'' Ms Brown said.
Fire
examined the scene this morning..
Nearby resident Brett
Wakeman said he raced out to the street when he heard fire trucks
tearing down the street.
"There was some concern about LPG gas tank next to the
building, they were directing the hoses onto that,'' he
said.
"I heard on the loud speaker that they had called in
the Hazmat team.
-----------------------
Members of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Hazardous
Materials Response team continue to vent the home where two workers and
a Milton Police officer inhaled fumes and were transported to Milton
Hospital this afternoon.
Milton Fire Chief John Grant said the HazMat team is
venting the home at 57 St. Mary's Road. for the second time as they
monitor vapor levels. The vapor being vented from the home is a
stripping agent that the two workers were using in the basement around
noon on Monday.
"We're not sure if that (Strip-Ease) on its own caused
the problems with the victims," Grant said. He added that exactly what
affected the victims would be determined by the
hospital.
A portion of St. Mary's Road remains blocked off while
the venting continues. Grant said there is no timeline for reopening the
road, as this situation is, "a matter of keeping an eye on
it."
Police were called to a house at 57 St. Mary's Road
earlier today after a worker stripping paint in the basement of the home
was overcome by fumes. A short time later, a second worker, as well as
an officer on the scene were taken by ambulance to Milton
Hospital.
HazMat arrived shortly after 1 p.m. At that
time, members of the Milton Fire Department spoke to residents in a few
homes close to the house in question. They suggested residents vacate
their homes while the 57 St. Mary's Road home was vented. Around 2:30
p.m. those resident's were OK'd to return to their
homes.
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