A week after a chemical fire at East Akron’s SMB Products, city officials said air quality tests showed no problems in the area but urged residents who were experiencing breathing trouble or other medical issues to seek care and report their concerns.
In a Thursday meeting for the group People Over Polymers at the Firestone Park library, fire department officials and the city’s director of public services said they continued to monitor air quality at a number of locations near the fire, including a nearby apartment complex.
At the time of the fire, methanol, xylene, propane, ether and ethanol were in the building at 1081 Rosemary Blvd., but officials said they did not know which of the chemicals had burned.
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Officials ordered the evacuation of people within a half-mile radius of the blaze on Sept. 5 but lifted the order later that night. Deputy Fire Chief Scott Pascu said the evacuation perimeter was decided using a computer modeling program that considers the direction of the wind and the most hazardous chemical to burn — in this case, xylene. Thursday, he said the air quality was at “very, very safe levels.”
The city is working on an after-action report to determine the effectiveness of its response, said Chris Ludle, the public safety director. He said a reverse 911 call made to those in the evacuation zone did not reach everyone it was intended to. Reverse 911 calls are automated messages from public safety organizations sent to people in a specific area during an emergency.
Some residents at the meeting also complained that no one had knocked on their doors to warn them to leave their homes.
“Some police vehicles have loudspeakers,” Ludle said. “We should have probably driven through with loudspeakers like they do in a hurricane.”
The complaints from residents, he said, were “helpful information” as city leaders look at how they might respond to a similar event in the future.
The report will also look at response times, available resources and performance, said Fire District Chief Sierjie Lash. She said that while firefighters acted according to their training, residents don’t practice evacuating, so there are things the department can learn from the experience.
Water supply not contaminated
The SMB facility had last been inspected in January, Lash said. Pascu said there was one violation during that inspection that was unrelated to the fire.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
One firefighter who went to the hospital has returned to work, Pascu said, and Lash said the normal gear firefighters use — including a self-contained breathing apparatus mask — was sufficient to protect them from the potential chemical fumes.
“That’s why we wanted more residents out,” she said. “They didn’t have that [mask].”
Some other city employees and residents went to the hospital to be checked out for potential health issues, but Lash said she didn’t know how many. Ludle said water and sewer employees who had scratchy throats after being at the scene were fine by Monday, with rest and hydration.
Still, residents such as Sharon Crawford said they could “taste what was in the air” even the day after the evacuation order was lifted.
“I smelled everything,” she said, particularly when she shopped at the nearby ALDI grocery store on South Arlington Street.
Ludle assured residents that the city’s drinking water supply wasn’t contaminated by runoff from the fire response. His department tested water that went into the storm sewers before it was released, he said, and SMB will be required to truck water in containment tanks on its property to a facility to be treated.
“There’s nothing from this fire that got into our water system, I promise you that,” he said.
But if residents feel ill, Lash told them to seek medical attention and to keep their records.
“The health and wellness of all of you, of everyone we serve, is our highest priority,” Pascu said.
Environmental groups weigh in, offer help
In addition to looking at the response to this fire, Beth Vild, the chief operating officer for Big Love Network, an environmental health equity organization, said she thought the city could benefit from having an industrial disaster preparedness plan — especially in East Akron, an area with the lion’s share of heavy industry in the city. The city recently named former fire chief Joseph Natko as the assistant to the mayor for emergency management.
Vild said she had been in touch with residents affected by the East Palestine train derailment and the chemical releases there last year. She said the responses to Akron residents so far are similar to what residents there were told.
She said a group in East Palestine had donated some money to help with mutual aid, including reimbursing people for doctors’ copays, lost wages, hotel costs, property damage or the loss of crops.
To ask for help, residents can go to www.biglovenetwork.us/big-love-emergency-fund/. They can also report medical issues to the Akron Regional Air Quality Management District at 330-375-2480 or www.scph.org/air-quality/complaints-0.
Vicky Abou-Ghalioum, the petrochemicals organizer for the Buckeye Environmental Network, said the groups want to support people affected by the fire to get their questions answered and “find out if they’re truly safe.”
