POLAND =97 Firefighters
responded to a small chemical spill at Poland Seminary High School on
Dobbins Road this morning.
Around 8:30 a.m., someone was
cleaning and knocked over a bottle of Xylene, a clear, colorless liquid
that can be very flammable. Students were asked to leave the classroom
where the spill was contained, but the building was not evacuated, said
township Police Chief Brian Goodin.
=93It had an odor to it, and as
a precaution, they called the fire department,=94 he said. =93It was
determined that it was nothing of any major issue. They used big fans to
blow the area out, and fortunately it was by one of the main
doors.=94
-----------------------
HYDERABAD: Two heavy vehicles
overturned in the city in separate incidents, creating chaos on arterial
roads on Thursday.
Motorists suffered a lot as
traffic got diverted after heavy vehicles turned turtle on the main
roads in Habsiguda and Saifabad on Thursday morning.
At about 5.30
am, a tanker (AP 16 TW 6433) carrying 25 tons of highly inflammable
`Toulene' chemical from Kakinada port to Jeedimetla overturned after
hitting the retaining wall of the Tarnaka flyover at its entry point. As
a result, motorists were forced to take a detour and travel 13
kilometres extra to reach their workplaces.
Immediately
after the accident, the driver fled from the spot as the chemical began
leaking onto the Uppal main road.
Police were immediately alerted
about the incident and after consulting the fire department officials,
cops learnt that the material was highly inflammable and immediately
blocked the road at Habsiguda and Mettuguda ends and diverted traffic
through Nacharam.
-----------------------
(01-13) 14:51
PST SAN FRANCISCO -- Seven San Francisco middle school students were
taken to hospitals Thursday after ingesting small amounts of rat poison
they found on top of a classroom filing cabinet, thinking the single
blue cube was candy, fire officials said.
The Martin Luther King Jr.
students, who showed no symptoms other than fear, were transported to
three local hospitals, but were not expected to suffer any harmful
consequences, said Fire Department spokeswoman Mindy Talmadge.
Talmadge said
one of the students found the small cube and took a little nibble and
told classmates it tasted like a cookie.
Six others, boys and girls
ranging in age from 10 to 12, then licked or bit pieces of the 1.5-inch
cube of poison and either swallowed or spit it out.
-----------------------
Two people are in custody after
hazmat and law enforcement crews found a meth lab inside a hotel on the
city's north side.
The raid occurred at the Hawthorn Suites on Zumstein
Drive shortly before 10 a.m. Thursday.
According to law enforcement
officers, the investigation began after a raid at a home last week led
police to the hotel near state Route 161. Police said a meth lab was
found inside one of the suites and hazmat crews worked to secure the
scene.
-----------------------
FLINT, Mich. -- The Genesee
County hazmat team responded to an emergency call Thursday morning that
ended up involving a dropped thermometer.
Officials said the Flint homeowner dropped the mercury-filled
thermometer inside her home in the 2300 block of Ohio Avenue just before
5 a.m.
She called 911, where operators
alerted the fire department who then called in the hazmat team
in.
Officials said most of the
mercury evaporated, but plans are in place to have the health department
brought in as a precautionary measure.
-----------------------
A small fluid
spill closed a busy Twin Falls intersection for about two hours
Thursday.
The Twin Falls Fire Department
was one of multiple agencies that responded to the spill at noon
Thursday at the intersection ofPole Line Road and Bridgeview
Boulevard.
Battalion Chief Brian Cunningham
said several motorists reported a container of fluid blocking the
eastbound lane of Pole Line. No witnesses reported seeing the vehicle
that dropped it. Cunningham said the container was a 2-gallon weed
sprayer containing an unknown fluid that had a vapor cloud coming off
it, noticeable even in the rain.
All roads
leading to the intersection were closed, except the west-most westbound
lane of Pole Line. Cunningham called in a hazardous materials response
team from Jerome.
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A boat carrying 2,400 tons of
sulfuric acid from the chemical company BASF capsized in Germany's Rhine
River at 5 a.m. today, Jan. 13. Rescuers are searching the river for two
missing men who are part of the ship's four-man crew.
At this
point, "to our knowledge no acid leaked into the river," from the
stainless steel double-hulled tanker called the Waldorf, Robert Baack,
the chief operating officer for Lehnkering, the company managing the
shipping, said in a statement.
The capsize happened, "for as
yet unexplained reasons," he noted.
River levels are higher than
normal due to recent melting of large quantities of snow that fell over
the past month, and the accident occurred at a narrow point in the river
which is known to have strong currents, according to AFP, the French
press agency.
The boat was carrying the sulfuric acid from
Ludwigshafen, in southern Germany to Antwerp, Belgium, says Ursula von
Stetten, a BASF spokeswoman.
-----------------------
WASHINGTON COUNTY -- Hazardous
materials crews were called to a Washington County gas station on
Wednesday after a fuel leak in the parking lot.
Channel 11's Jodine Costanzo reported that a tanker
truck had delivered gas to a BP station in South Strabane Township when
about 100 gallons of fuel seeped out of an underground holding
tank.
Firefighters and Hazmat crews
closed off the parking lot and alerted nearby businesses as they cleaned
up the mess.
-----------------------
BENNINGTON, Vt. -- Mace, the
company that makes tear gas and pepper spray products, says it will
plead guilty to a federal charge of storing hazardous waste at its
Vermont plant without a permit and will pay a $100,000 fine.
Mace Security
International Inc. announced the intended settlement Monday.
Mace and
founder John Goodrich were charged with keeping hazardous waste in
buildings at its Bennington plant and in shipping containers outside it.
The company says it has spent more than $785,000 cleaning up the
site.
Mace tells the Bennington Banner the subsidiary
company, Mace Personal Defense Inc., has submitted the plea agreement to
the U.S. attorney in Vermont. It must be approved by prosecutors and a
federal judge.
-----------------------
One person was killed and 12 others injured in a
mysterious blast at a newly-operational chemical factory in Vapi GIDC
early on Wednesday.
The deceased is a factory worker but his identity is
yet to be established. Six of the injured include fire brigade
personnel, as the site is situated opposite the office of the Vapi GIDC
Fire Brigade.
The injured have been shifted to nearby hospitals in
Vapi where their condition is reported to be critical.
Authorities
have approached factory inspectors and Forensic Science Laboratory
officials to ascertain the exact cause of the blast.
According to
the Fire Brigade, a blast took place in one of the vessels where some
chemical process at high temperature and pressure was under progress, at
Arson Chemicals in Vapi GIDC, Phase II.
-----------------------
NEW BLAST NEAR OIL PORT
FOS-LAVERA, TRAFFIC NORMAL | ENERGY & OIL | REUTERS,
http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFLDE70B0WX20110112
PARIS/MARSEILLE Jan 12 (Reuters) - Fire fighters reported a blast at a
petrochemical site in Fos-Lavera on Wednesday, the second incident in
less than a week in the sprawling industrial zone, but traffic at the
nearby oil terminal was not affected.
No one was injured in the
incident, which occured just before 0400 GMT on the site of
petrochemical plant Compagnie Petrochimique de Berre, a unit of U.S.
group LyondellBasell (LYB.N: Quote).
The aftermath of the explosion
and an ensuing spill of oil products have now been brought under
control, rescue teams told Reuters.
A spokeswoman at LyondellBasell
said a fire started in a trench on the site of Compagnie Petrochimique
de Berre and that an investigation was being carried out to find out
what caused the blast.
"We have heard an explosion but this was a fire
really. We are still investigating," she said, adding this had not
affected LyondellBasell's neighbouring refinery.
"There has
been no consequence, no injury, no output interruption and no
consequence for the environment."
-----------------------
A veteran Los
Angeles fire captain was injured after an explosion at a car fire
rendered him unconscious on Jan. 9.
Engine 1
responded the fire at 546 West Solano Avenue shortly after 9 p.m. on
Jan. 9 near the Arroyo Seco Parkway in Elysian Park, according to a
department report.
Read Report
Crews found a 2000 Chevy Impala fully involved and
used a 1-and-a-half-inch line to attack the blaze but had problems
containing it.
The sedan began leaking fuel,
which ignited. It was attacked with a dry chemical extinguisher while
the engineer established a 2-and-a-half-inch supply line.
The captain directed both firefighters to establish
an additional line for Class B foam application and as they were
establishing the line, the captain observed fire in the passenger
compartment and attacked the fire with the initial attack
line.
The application of water to the
fire around the steering column caused a violent explosion, forcing the
captain backwards and causing him to hit his head on the
pavement.
He was rendered unconscious and
was assessed by fellow firefighters.
-----------------------
Factory workers in Crown Heights, Brooklyn braved
the cold Wednesday, after a chemical explosion forced officials to
evacuate their workplace.
Fire
officials say someone mixed an acid into tanks of bleach stored inside
industrial drums at the Sea Crest Linen Supply company, leading to an
explosion just before noon.
Bleach is a commonly used
ingredient in the manufacturing of linens.
Several workers were given
oxygen at the scene, but no serious injuries were reported.
Some of the
roughly 200 employees working at the business, which supplies linens to
restaurants and hotels, described a loud explosion before they left the
building.
-----------------------
Dangerous concentrations of lead
have been found in fields close to the the Moerdijk chemicals packaging
company which went up in flames last week.
Chemistry professor Jacob de
Boer told television programme Nieuwsuur the amount of lead - up to a
thousand times the permited level - is 'extremely worrying'.
Officials
have so far maintained there is no danger to human health from soot
released in the blaze.
Liable
Nevertheless, on Tuesday Breda
mayor Peter van der Velden said the plant may have broken its licencing
conditions and could be liable.
Van der Velden was speaking on
behalf of the public prosecution department and refused to answer any
further questions, news agency ANP said.
A department spokesman told ANP
officials had carried out searches of the Chemie-Pack offices, and that
revealed possible infringements of the licence.
But he too
refused to go into further details.
A spokesman for the company also
refused to elaborate on the allegations
Dioxin
Meanwhile, it
also emerged on Tuesday that cancer-causing dioxins had been found in
the soot which had fallen in a 10-mile radius of the blaze. But the
concentrations 'were not unusual' in the winter, Dordrecht mayor Arno
Brok was quoted as saying by Nos tv.
A high concentration of dioxin
found in grass growing 3 km from the fire was being looked into, he
said.
Nevertheless, previous advice not to eat winter
vegetables and to keep children and livestock indoors remains in force,
Brok said.
-----------------------
Chemie-Pack, the Dutch chemical company which burned
down last week, apparently repeatedly flaunted environmental and fire
safety regulations. The current affairs programme EenVandaag, which has
seen inspection reports dating back to 2002, says that despite this it
continued to be granted permits.
As early as October 2002 the
Public Prosecutor's Office threatened Chemie-Pack with sanctions for
contravening fire safety regulations. The company's automatic sprinkler
system was not operating properly and the roof was not sufficiently
fire-resistant. Between 2007 and 2009 inspectors reported that chemicals
were not stored correctly.
Fierce chemical fires broke out
at Chemie-Pack's plant in Moerdijk, south of Rotterdam, on Thursday last
week. It took firefighters over 30 hours to get the blaze under
control.
Professor of Environmental Science Lucas Reijnders,
who studied the documents for the TV programme, says the company should
have been shut down.
-----------------------
FIREFIGHTERS cleared up a
chemical spillage in a Hampshire supermarket car park in the early hours
of today.
A crew from Romsey fire station dressed in
protective gear spread granules to absorb dangerous industrial fluids
after cordoning off the car park area in Waitrose car park in Alma Road,
Romsey, just after midnight.
The fluid was leaking from drums
in a parked lorry.
A nail had pierced a 200 litre container causing
highly flammable and toxic fluid used in the rubber industry to leak
out. The driver raised the alarm.
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