A chemical release at a north Toledo, Ohio, company prompted an evacuation of nearby residents, including some who described concerning health effects and an alarming foglike haze.
Glycol methacrylate, an industrial coating product, was released into the air Tuesday night, Toledo Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz told reporters Wednesday morning. One person, a first responder, was injured and taken to the hospital, he added, but officials believe the injury is not serious.
Officials do not know what caused the chemical release, which the city clarified was not an explosion.
At 5 p.m. Wednesday, the evacuation zone, which at its peak affected about 1,000 residents within a 1-mile radius, was reduced to a half-mile zone around the facility, and a shelter-in-place order for a 3-mile radius was lifted, the city said.
“Toledo Fire & Rescue hazardous materials personnel are working with federal, state and local partners to monitor conditions, coordinate mitigation efforts, and evaluate next steps,” the city said in an update Wednesday night.
An employee at the company, MC Tank Transport, called 911 to alert authorities to the release Tuesday night, Kapszukiewicz said. He said that the company is headquartered in Arkansas and that executives were on their way to Toledo to assess the situation.
Kapszukiewicz said that when the chemical was released, it became a gas, but when it settles back into the tank, it will turn again into a liquid.
In a statement Wednesday, MC Tank Transport confirmed that “equipment associated with our operations” was involved in the incident and said it was working with emergency authorities.
“We understand the serious disruption this incident has caused to nearby residents and businesses, particularly those required to evacuate their homes,” it said. “We are committed to assisting those affected.”
Haze and irritants
Dense fog and haze hindered visibility in the city of about 265,000 people, and local news stations reported a plasticlike odor.
“That is the chemical whose plume we are monitoring, and we are concerned enough about the health impacts to have taken two actions overnight,” Kapszukiewicz said.
He said people in and around the evacuation zone might react to the chemical in the air — they might taste or smell something unnatural, or their eyes could water. He called that a “real concern.”
But residents should take note of whether those exposures are dangerous or simply annoying.
“There is no question that we’re all kind of smelling and sensing, that there’s something there,” Kapszukiewicz said. “That doesn’t necessarily mean that it is something that is harming us immediately. There are levels of exposure to something like this that are unpleasant but not necessarily dangerous to human health, and that entered into our decision-making in terms of where the shelter-in-place orders took place.”
The chemical is a long-term carcinogen, Toledo Health Commissioner Karim Baroudi said. But he added that there is “no immediate danger” related to Tuesday night’s release.
Baroudi said people who feel irritation from the chemical should shower to wash it off their bodies.
Kapszukiewicz thanked all community agencies that helped respond to the event, including those who assisted in evacuating residents and setting up shelters. He said his administration has been in touch with both the state and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
“We understand the seriousness of what has happened here,” he said. “That’s why we took the actions that we did. That’s why we’re going to continue to monitor and communicate with the public throughout the day.”
Kapszukiewicz acknowledged the fog hanging over his city Wednesday morning and said that while the chemical release was a factor, the weather also caused natural fog.
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Videos posted to social media and verified by NBC News showed hazy skies as residents in the danger zone drove with their hazard lights on. Streetlamps and car lights were visible through the fog as a line of vehicles appeared to try to leave the area. Some videos appeared to show buses and emergency vehicles in an empty parking lot, surrounded by the fog.
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Another video, taken from a distance, showed thick plumes of smoke gathering in the air. The smoke appeared to be coming from one building.
The tank at MC Tank Terminal is a “transport hub,” said Michael Posadny, the special operations deputy fire chief in charge of hazmat. It keeps products on site briefly before it ships them to their next locations.
Kapszukiewicz said: “In a city like Toledo, with industrial history, events like this, as unpleasant and unwelcome as they are, sometimes happen. And, you know, we have gotten through events like this before. We’ll get through them again.”
‘It’s like a scary movie’
Alicia Cortez was outside walking her dog Tuesday night when she noticed a hazy fog hanging over her area. About 30 minutes later, she told NBC News, she and her husband got alerts on their phones alerting them that hazardous materials were nearby.
When she went back outside, “it was everywhere,” she said. The site was down the street from her family’s home in Toledo. When her husband got through to 911, the dispatcher told him he didn’t have a choice — he had to evacuate immediately.
At around 10:30 p.m., she and her husband packed two cars with their kids, Cortez’s mother-in-law and only the essentials. On their ride to a hotel outside the evacuation zone, “you couldn’t even see in front of you,” she said.
The thick fog was stuck on windshields and cars, Cortez said. It was sticky and burned their eyes. Her mother-in-law got out of the car and walked in front of the group, directing traffic through the haze.
Cortez said her family returned around noon Wednesday to check on their house. She has a headache, and her daughter has a cough. All of their throats are bothering them, she said. The chemical smell was hanging inside their home as her husband taped windows shut to avoid more leaking inside.
They showered the fog off their bodies and retrieved more clothing. They plan to return to the hotel Wednesday night because they “just don’t trust it,” she said.
“It was scary, very scary. It’s like a scary movie,” Cortez said, adding later, “I can’t even believe what I experienced last night.”
Another resident, Emily Downey, told NBC News’ “Top Story” that she awoke on her couch to the smell of chemicals, a bad headache and burning eyes. Her daughter’s eyes were bloodshot, she said, and she had a sore throat.
Downey initially believed her family was far enough from the site that they wouldn’t have to evacuate.
“Then I looked outside, and I was just immediately, like, shocked, because I could barely see anything,” she said. “You can’t see the car across the street.”
Despite the severely limited visibility, she said, her family was able to drive on the expressway and get to her eldest daughter’s home.
“It was probably one of the only times in my life that I really, truly was like, ‘Are we gonna die?’” she said. “That might sound dramatic to some people, but it was very dramatic.”
