(The following story by John O’Connor appeared on The State website on January 9.)
COLUMBIA, S.C. — With a nuclear facility, railways, mills and factories nearby, Aiken County fire, police and medical professionals have long prepared for the worst possible emergencies.
That planning became reality early Thursday when a train crash released chlorine gas through the town of Graniteville.
The response, several experts said, went smoothly. But it also might be a best-case scenario for emergency response in South Carolina.
“With SRS there and the hospitals, it was certainly one of the better places for it to happen,” said Vincent Van Brunt, a University of South Carolina engineering professor who teaches a course on chemical-plant safety.
“If you are in a truly rural area — not Graniteville — what kind of response you’d get is not clear.”
People living in or near a large city, near the Savannah River Site or close to one of South Carolina’s four nuclear plant sites have the best access in South Carolina to first-rate emergency response teams, experts said.
Many smaller towns are less prepared and may not have money to purchase the protective gear that Aiken first-responders had, said Jim Bowie, executive director of the S.C. Fireman’s Association. Nor can they afford to send their emergency personnel to advanced training courses.
In Graniteville’s case, help from Aiken responders was only about 15 minutes away, and access to hospitals in Aiken and Augusta was only minutes more.
SRS, a large federal research and nuclear storage facility, is only about 20 minutes away. And local emergency responders had learned from SRS because they often coordinate and drill with SRS teams.
Early Thursday morning, SRS sent a four-man hazardous materials team to aid with searches and evacuations, said Bill Taylor, a Department of Energy spokesman.
Aiken officials also took advantage of SRS computers, which calculated weather conditions to predict where the chlorine cloud might drift.
“You might say that’s a unique capability,” Taylor said.
At University Hospital in Augusta, officials had drilled for a chemical spill because the hospital sits close to a rail line. That hospital also has a physician who has experience treating patients suffering from chlorine gas exposure.
Early Thursday, hundreds of night-shift employees deployed a hazmat triage unit that decontaminated patients and then treated them with oxygen.
Another Augusta hospital, Doctors Hospital, also has a renowned regional burn unit.
A DISPARITY
Other areas don’t have the same resources.
McCormick County, for example, has limited resources to deal with a similar disaster.
Rail lines pass through the county from Augusta, Ga., carrying the same chemicals involved in Thursday’s spill.
Should a similar accident occur, officials there will have to call on surrounding counties to bring in technician-level emergency crews, said Chris Doolittle, McCormick County emergency services coordinator.
In about an hour, crews can arrive in the county to possibly stop the leak, he said.
Until then, local crews can isolate the area and evacuate residents, Doolittle said.
By March, the county expects to have its own technician-level personnel to handle such emergencies.
Thursday’s spill led his department to review its emergency procedures, Doolittle said.
“This has been a wake-up call for us,” he said.
Many S.C. counties, including Aiken, have adopted models that focus on coordination and communication among agencies.
That coordination, Bowie said, is key to any response. “There’s no one agency that can do this alone,” he said.
In addition, health department employees in 13 offices across the state have hazardous response training and can supplement local efforts.
But many still worry what their response would be.
“I can’t count the number of trains that come through here,” said Capt. Don Pester of Hardeeville Fire and Rescue. “We’ve got a pretty good handful.”
Rail lines passing through town mean the threat of a chemical spill is always possible.
In a hazardous materials emergency, Hardeeville fire crews can call on teams from Hilton Head Island to go in and work with the chemicals, Pester said.
But it could take up to 30 minutes for crews from Hilton Head Island to get there, he said.
THE WORST CASE
The spill near Graniteville was among the most difficult for which emergency workers prepare. Responding to the train crash meant providing first aid and search and rescue efforts. It also meant decontaminating and evacuating thousands of Graniteville residents. It required protective clothing and breathing apparatuses. Later, it meant finding shelter and clothing for those displaced.
But advance planning eased efforts to mobilize and organize the several hundred police, fire and medical workers who responded to the accident.
“I stopped counting,” Aiken County sheriff’s spokesman Lt. Michael Frank said during a Friday press briefing, after being asked about the number of responders.
Since Sept. 11, 2001, local, state and federal officials have made training for chemical, biological and other contaminants a priority, said fire and emergency officials. Responding to hazardous materials is one of the first classes most firefighters take.
Aiken county and city public safety workers frequently observe SRS drills, Taylor said.
That experience paid off, said USC’s Van Brunt. “Everything is working like a well-oiled machine,” he said Friday.
Joseph Farmer, with the S.C. Emergency Management Division, said with nuclear sites scattered around the state, the department has prepared for emergencies in all parts of South Carolina.
The Emergency Management Division has developed detailed emergency plans for situations ranging from dealing with a dangerous wild animal on the loose to earthquakes.
“If you prepare for one incident,” Farmer said, “you prepare for them all.”
After Thursday’s crash, the department was coordinating efforts of several hundred workers. Law enforcement officers closed roads and enforced curfews. The Department of Social Services opened shelters — for people and animals.
Despite training and forethought, there still may be little rescuers can do in some cases, such as a train accident.
Charles Feigley, an environmental health sciences professor at USC, said responding to a disaster at a fixed facility — such as a treatment plant — is easier.
That’s because responders know the location and amount of dangerous chemicals and can develop a strategy in advance, said Feigley, who once worked at a chlorine plant.
In contrast, a rail accident like Thursday’s has many variables, he said. First responders didn’t know how much of the chemical had escaped or how many people were nearby, for instance.
“By the time authorities are informed about this, it’s almost too late,” Feigley said.
Despite confusion from residents, Feigley said, authorities were right in initially ordering residents to stay inside before evacuating about 15 hours after the accident.
If residents left immediately, they would have risked exposure to gas still in the air, he said.
Farmer declined to evaluate the ongoing response effort but said the state would be prepared for the next emergency.
“We can’t prevent that,” he said of the rail accident, “We can just respond to it.”
(Staff writer J.R. Gonzales contributed to this report.)