Paul Bass Photo
(Updated: 6:34 p.m.) A clean-up crew was on scene at the evacuated 300 George St. biomedical research building Tuesday afternoon to clean an apparent chemical spill.
The spill occurred inside the third-floor laboratories of Melinta Therapeutics, an antibiotics company, according to Assistant Chief Mark Vendetto.
The chemical is believed to be phosphorus pentasulfide.
“No one was hurt, thank God,” said Fire Chief John Alston Jr. His department cleared most of the building — except the third floor —for employees to return to work Wednesday.
Officials at first thought the odor came from a gas leak, not a chemical leak. They cleared out the research building at George and College Streets around 9:30 a.m. At first they also cleared out neighboring office buildings, as well, sending some 1,000 workers out into the cold morning air. Emergency officials set up a mobile command post a block away from 300 George and closed surrounding streets.
A mix of independent and Yale-affiliated companies operate out of 300 George, which is owned by Winstanley Enterprises.
By lunch, officials allowed people back into surrounding buildings but kept 300 George clear of employees. The gas company confirmed that there was not a gas leak. The command post was dismantled around 1:30, while fire crews remained on scene, including in the lobby of 300 George (above).
The hazmat crew arrived shortly after 1 p.m.
“We have isolated it to a single floor and a single lab,” Assistant Chief Vendetto reported at the scene. He said that hazardous leak occurred in a third-floor lab. He was waiting for a crew from the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection to arrive and assess the situation before identifying the material involved or the company.
“There is no health risk to the public,” Vendetto said.
Vendetto was seen conferring with unidentified concerned 300 George workers in the building lobby (at left in photo) as officials were revising their assessment to the existence of a chemical, not gas, leak. “Something from your lab’s causing this smell,” he informed them. (See the exchange at the 4 minute mark in the Facebook Live video at the bottom of this story.)
300 George employees continued to mill the sidewalk waiting for word on whether they would be returning to work at all Tuesday. Marty Mattesich (pictured) of the third-floor research company L2 Diagnostics took the opportunity to get a haircut at Y Haircutting around the corner on York Street. He seemed unperturbed back outside 300 George. “They’re doing a very good job,” he said. “They’ve got it under control.”
Firefighters from Truck 1 and Engine 4 on George Street.
Close to 4 p.m., Assistant Chief Orlando Mercado reported that DEEP had identified the problem and hired a crew to clean up the spill.
“They were working on a chemical in a lab. The chemical spread. That’s what caused odor, which went into the HVAC system,” Mercado said. “It’s benign. It’s not a health risk.”
Chief Alston said employees will be able to return to all floors except the third floor “definitely by tomorrow morning.”
Before the third-floor employees can return, DEEP needs to call in an industrial hygienist to take air samples to see how much of the chemical people would still be exposed to. “By our accounts, it would be fine. DEEP is requiring an independent reading, and we concur.”
Fifteen mile-per-hour winds carried the odors through downtown streets Tuesday morning; the odor was detectable as far as Edgewood and Day streets. Part of the chemical compound emits an odor that smells similar to natural gas.
Melinta Therapeutics describes its mission as meeting “meet the continually evolving threat of bacterial infections by discovering, developing, and commercializing a continual stream of novel antibiotics.” It claims to be “dedicated to saving lives threatened by the global public health crisis of bacterial infections.” Three Yale professors, William L. Jorgenson, Peter Moore, and Thomas A. Steitz, founded the company.