A billowing plume from a chemical plant in Conyers, Ga., prompted an evacuation order that affected about 17,000 people on Sunday, including a large portion of the city and a shutdown of a six-mile stretch of the I-20 highway, officials said.
A small fire broke out on the roof of a plant for BioLab, a manufacturer of pool and spa treatment products, at about 5:30 a.m. Sunday, Fire Chief Marian McDaniel of Rockdale County said at an evening news conference.
The fire triggered the plant’s sprinkler system, which caused water to mix with a “water-reactive chemical,” and created a large plume of smoke and chemicals, the chief said.
The authorities previously said the sprinkler system had malfunctioned. The cause of the fire was not immediately clear. There were no immediate reports of injuries.
The fire was contained at first but then reignited around noon, Chief McDaniel said.
“For the past two or three hours, we have been battling that fire to where we now have it out,” Chief McDaniel said.
The water-reactive chemical was still creating a plume and emergency responders were working to move the chemical from the water, Chief McDaniel said. The roof and several of the walls of BioLab’s plant have collapsed.
Smoke may linger for “several days,” Chief McDaniel warned. Eric J. Levett, the Rockdale County sheriff, urged residents to stay out of the area because wind may blow smoke beyond the evacuation zone.
It was not immediately clear what health hazards the plume might pose.
“Our employees are accounted for with no injuries reported,” BioLab said in a statement on Sunday night. “Our team is on the scene, working with first responders and local authorities to assess and contain the situation.”
What type of chemicals caused the plume and how they were being stored was not immediately clear, Chief McDaniel said. A spokesman for BioLab said he could not provide more specifics about the chemicals that set off the plume.
An evacuation order was in place Sunday for a large part of Conyers, according to maps posted on the county’s Facebook page. The city, which has about 17,000 people, is about 25 miles outside of Atlanta.
Piedmont Rockdale Hospital in the city remained open but was moving some patients to other facilities, Sharon Webb, the director of the Emergency Management Agency for Rockdale County, said Sunday night.
When certain chemicals interact with the hydrogen and oxygen in water, intense heat can be created because hydrogen is flammable and oxygen is an oxidizer, said Wendy J. Buckley, the president of STARS Hazmat Consulting, a hazardous materials consulting company.
“That can be so hot that it can also combust nearby materials and the reaction can be explosive,” Ms. Buckley said. “It can also release flammable, toxic or otherwise hazardous gases.”
More information about the chemicals will be needed to better understand the reaction, she said.
City officials said that state emergency teams were helping but that resources were stretched thin because of the response required to the damage caused in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene.
Chief McDaniel said that this was “the third incident of this magnitude” at the plant in the seven years she has been in her role.
In September 2020, a plume of hazardous chemicals was released at the Conyers plant, exposing company workers and nine firefighters to “dangerous fumes, and caused a portion of Interstate 20 near the facility to be closed for approximately six hours,” according to the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board report.
Surrounding businesses were evacuated and the estimated property damage was more than $1 million, the report said.
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