Articles Posted in Dow Hahnville Leak

New Orleans’ Gambit had an impressive editorial a little while back that outlined how the Dow Hahnville chemical leaks demonstrate the need for a more prevalent presence on the part of state government in overseeing the safety habits of such plants. The Gambit’s editorial staff writes

The first Dow leak also exposed communication gaps between emergency officials in St. Charles Parish and their counterparts in Orleans and Jefferson parishes, who said they were not notified until several hours after the event. The leak further revealed that too few residents have registered contact information with the St. Charles Parish emergency alert system. That’s a cautionary tale for all residents this hurricane season. Earlier, a power outage at Cytec caused the release of a toxic ammonia vapor, plant authorities say. West Bank residents reported eye and throat irritations before the company gave the all-clear signal.

  Last week’s incidents raise public concerns about potential toxic ammonia leaks from a cold-storage warehouse the Port of New Orleans wants to build on the riverfront near the historic French Market. In addition to trying to keep 500 jobs in the city while raising $40 million for the project, officials at the port and New Orleans Cold Storage Inc. (NOCS) must now assure the public that 40,000 pounds of anhydrous ammonia can be safely transported, stored and used to blast-freeze chicken packages on the Gov. Nicholls Street Wharf. The proposal has pitted French Quarter and Faubourg Marigny residents against port officials and business interests.

The Hahnville chemical leak that took place at the Dow Chemical plant is a story that has been getting a lot of traction in New Orleans, throughout the state and even nationally. As residents were exposed to an unknown amount of the dangerous gas without even knowing it, answers are being demanded and true responses should be coming from the company. The state of Louisiana is showing initiative in investigating Dow Chemical for their part in the leak of ethyl acrylate from a tank into the air, thereafter affecting countless people in the Southeastern Louisiana area. The Times-Picayune reports

A state Department of Environmental Quality official said Monday that an investigator has been at .Dow Chemical’s Hahnville plantnearly every day to investigate the cause of the the July 7 leak of ethyl acrylate fumes that irritated the noses eyes and throats of residents for miles around.

“He’s meeting with Dow people and asking some very tough questions about what happened, how it happened and how can we prevent it from happening again,” said Mike Alegro, manager of the DEQ’s southeast regional office, Monday afternoon.

This morning’s Times-Picayune released a highly important timeline for the Dow chemical leak on July 7th in Hahnville, as well as provides insight into just how inattentive Dow may have been to the matter at the point of the leak and hours after. The article reports

The EOC’s telephone log from the early hours of that morning shows parish personnel wrestling with the decision of whether and where to close off River Road in Hahnville as Dow employees attempted to dampen the fumes.

The parish got the first indication that something was amiss at 3:57 a.m., when an employee at the Shell Chemical plant in Norco, across the Mississippi River, called the EOC and said he smelled an acrylic odor, but that no alarms had sounded at his plant.

Dow-Hahnville’s chemical leak may be a returning reality for residents of Southeast Louisiana with bad weather looming. As the 10-day forecast shows thunderstorms in the New Orleans area’s future, area officials are warning the smell associated with last Tuesday’s chemical leak by the Dow company may return. Per the Times-Picayune,

Stormy weather passing through St. Charles Parish may increase odors from the Dow Chemical ethyl acrylate tank, parish officials said in an recent e-mail alert to residents.

Dow is taking continuing actions to suppress these odors, but residents should call the parish Emergency Operations Center at 985.783.5050 to report an odor.

The Times-Picayune breaks the following, which details that Dow’s Hahnville leak a week ago was not only a surprise incident to the company but, instead, one of a series of leaks that very well may have been avoided. In an article posted on NOLA.com, the Times-Picayune writes

An environmental watchdog group says foul-smelling ethyl acrylate fumes escaped from Dow Chemical’s Hahnville plant twice before the July 7 release that sent the odor over much of the New Orleans area.

The Louisiana Bucket Brigade will hold a news conference at 9 a.m. to discuss its findings that fumes from the plant have escaped three times since October including last week’s event.

Buried under the news of Dow’s chemical leak and cleanup and more people being hospitalized for demonstrating symptoms of exposure to ethyl acrylate, WDSU reports MORE chemical vapors were released during cleanup. Pockets of the ethyl acrylate were again released, adding to the existing smell blanketing parts of St. Charles Parish. In their report on the cleanup taking place at the Dow-Hahnville plant, WDSU mentions

Workers at the plant have been trying since Tuesday to neutralize the chemical and move it to sealed containers. It was during that process that more was released.

“This morning what happened is some of these small amounts of EA that are let out that did not neutralize became exposed to the environment,” said Rodney Mallet, of the Department of Environmental Quality.

In further developments regarding the Hahnville chemical leak by Dow Chemical, the tank responsible for releasing unknown amounts of hazardous chemicals into the air has been drained by the company. The Times-Picayune’s article on the issue has two interesting points worth noting:

“One drop of [ethyl acrylate] would send everybody running from this room,” company spokesman Tommy Faucheux told reporters at a news conference Thursday.

This point is odd because just as Dow keeps insisting no major damage has occurred, their spokesman speaks candidly on just how offensive and harmful the chemical could be in the form of a mere drop.