Scores of Georgia residents already reeling from Hurricane Helene have been grappling with fallout from one other catastrophe over the previous week: a chemical-plant inferno bathing their neighborhood in poisonous gases.
The damaging blaze ignited final Sunday — simply days after the killer ‘cane slammed the state — on the BioLab plant in Rockdale County southeast of Atlanta, officers mentioned.
The catastrophe, which was unrelated to the climate chaos, erupted when a malfunctioning fire-sprinkler head sprayed water on unstable chemical compounds, kicking off a sequence response that resulted in a sky-high eruption of multicolored poisonous smoke, they mentioned.
Seventeen thousand folks have been evacuated from the world, and round 90,000 extra have been ordered to shelter in place as an ominous smoke column loomed over the county and spewed chlorine fuel all through the week.
County authorities have prolonged the stay-at-home order by way of this previous weekend as HAZMAT groups labored to include the “continued reaction,” BioLab mentioned on its web site.
The county had already suffered harm from Helene, together with downed energy strains and timber that hit a number of native houses.
The toxic inferno was the third hearth that has damaged out within the Rockdale plant, county hearth Chief Marian McDonald advised reporters.
Now the feds are investigating BioLab for doable corner-cutting – and never for the primary time.
“We are sending investigators to the site to determine the cause of this dangerous incident and the safety gaps at the facility that allowed this huge fire to occur,” mentioned Steve Owens, chairman of the US Chemical Security Board.
BioLab manufactures trichloroisocyanuric acid, which is used to kill germs in swimming swimming pools and spas. TCCA is secure when dissolved in our bodies of water, however having it contact smaller quantities of water can produce an explosive response that releases chlorine fuel.
Two fires broke out at BioLab crops in 2020: one when rainwater from Hurricane Laura leaked right into a Louisiana plant and one other on the Rockdale County web site that uncovered plant employees and 9 firefighters to poisonous fumes, in accordance with a CSB investigation final 12 months.
That probe revealed a slew of minimize corners and shoddy security protocols on the websites, together with buildings that weren’t ready for excessive climate and “an inadequate and largely nonfunctional fire protection system and the absence of automated sprinkler systems,” the report mentioned.
In an e-mail to WSB-TV Atlanta, the corporate mentioned it had “rebuilt its production facility with numerous enhanced safety features.”
Satirically, one such security function – automated sprinkler heads – was what allegedly kicked off the current blaze, in accordance with county authorities.
Some business insiders don’t purchase that rationalization.
“I have never in my entire career as a firefighter, fire officer, fire chief, and state fire marshal, experienced a fire sprinkler device ‘malfunction’ without human interaction,” the Nationwide Fireplace Sprinkler Affiliation President Shane Ray advised Fireplace and Saftey Journal Americas.
