Atlanta likely to be covered by haze and chlorine odor from chemical lab fire, officials warn

Haze and a chlorine odor are likely to descend upon Atlanta on Thursday as officials struggle to contain the fallout from a chemical lab fire that ignited Sunday.

Air quality monitoring detected elevated chlorine levels overnight around a BioLab facility in Conyers, the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency said in a news release Wednesday.

With weather models predicting a wind shift, there is a high likelihood that people across metro Atlanta will wake up on Thursday morning seeing haze and smelling chlorine, the agency said.

The cause of the elevated chlorine levels was a fire that ignited on the roof of the BioLab plant in Conyers, in Rockdale County, at 5 a.m. Sunday. It has been put out, but the resulting release of chemical gas prompted a shelter-in-place recommendation for the entire county, population 93,570, as well as mandatory evacuation orders for residents near the plant.

While the air quality findings announced Wednesday were above the action level for chlorine, the emergency management agency said workers on site have continued to make progress in neutralizing the product. Periodic increases in chlorine levels around the facility are expected as the process continues, it said.

Forecasts predict that winds will start shifting from east to west after sunset Wednesday, and smoke is predicted to settle toward the ground as it nears Atlanta, which is about 30 miles west of Conyers. As the air lifts back up in the afternoon and evening on Thursday, though, the smell and haze should dissipate, the emergency management agency said.

Smoke that contains chlorine compounds can cause irritation of the eyes and the airways and other symptoms. People with heart or lung disease might experience additional symptoms, like chest pain, shortness of breath or fatigue. The emergency management agency recommends that people limit exposure to the smoke by staying inside and keeping indoor air as clean as possible.

Rockdale County residents have since taken to social media to express their frustration with the situation, with comments like, “Driving though that mess BURNS and working right here has me feeling like I’m gonna develop a third eye pretty soon” and “I already know a lot of people having lung/chest pain and other complications from this in the areas being told to ‘shelter in place.'”

Thomas Chastain, who works just across the street from the BioLab plant, said he knows a few people who have had breathing problems. He also said the county has been sending conflicting messages.

“It’s a very irritating situation for all us citizens,” he said. “We get a hundred messages a day, and one says it’s safe and then the next one says, ‘Oh, it’s not safe.'”

Chastain also said members of the community are petitioning to remove BioLab from Rockdale.

The emergency management agency said chlorine levels in the air are at safe levels.

A number of state and federal agencies, including the state emergency management office and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, continue to monitor air quality in the Atlanta area using the Trace Atmospheric Gas Analyzer, a self-contained mobile laboratory capable of real-time monitoring of outdoor air or emissions.