Four hospitalized in West Virginia chemical spill

A handful of people have been hospitalized and several hundred thousand remain without water after a chemical leaked from a storage tank in Charleston into the public water treatment system, state authorities said Saturday.

About 300,000 people in nine counties entered their third day Saturday without being able to drink, bathe in, or wash dishes or clothes with their tap water after a foaming agent escaped a chemical tank belonging to Freedom Industries – a Charleston company that produces specialty chemicals for the mining, steel and cement industries – and seeped into the Elk River. The only allowed use of the water was for flushing toilets.

By Friday evening, 737 people had contacted the West Virginia Poison Center to report concerns or symptoms related to the spill, director Elizabeth Scharman said.

American Water is the company that services the nine affected counties by the spill.

According to Allison Adler of the Department of Health and Human Resources, by Saturday 32 people had sought treatment at area hospitals for symptoms like nausea and vomiting. Of those, four people were admitted to the Charleston Area Medical Center. Their conditions were not immediately known.

The chemical spill brought West Virginia's capital and nearby areas to a virtual standstill on Friday, closing schools and offices and even forcing the state's Legislature to cancel its business for the day.

State, city and federal officials were organizing shipments of clean water in tankers, including a million liters of water provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, as residents lined up with buckets and containers to take what they could carry home. 

Officials also focused on getting water to people who needed it, particularly the elderly and disabled. 

On Friday, the White House declared the affected counties a federal disaster area, as the U.S. Attorney's office announced it was conducting an investigation into when and how the spill occurred. 

Freedom Industries issued a statement Friday pledging to work with authorities to stop the leak and determine its scale, local media reported.

"Our mission now is to move to the next phase of remediation … taking the contaminated dirt off site," company president Gary Southern told reporters, according to the West Virginia State Journal.

"We have mitigated the risk, we believe, in terms of further material leaving this facility," he said.

Environmental regulators in the state found that Freedom Industries had initially taken "no spill containment measures" to stem the leak, according to the Charleston Gazette.

Regulators also said the company violated the Air Pollution Control Act and the Water Pollution Control Act, the Gazette reported.

State regulators said Friday that the company never told them of the leak, and found out only after residents complained of a strange smell, according to the State Journal.

“We started to respond when the water was impacted,” said Jeff McIntyre, president of West Virginia American Water.

"We don't know that the water's not safe. But I can't say that it is safe."

Experts say there is no way to treat the tainted water aside from flushing the system until it's in low-enough concentrations to be safe, a process that could take days.

People across the nine affected counties were told not to wash their clothes in water affected, as the compound can cause symptoms ranging from skin irritation and rashes to vomiting and diarrhea.

The primary component in the foaming agent that leaked is the chemical 4-methylcyclohexane methanol.

The agent is mixed with ground-up coal to separate it from soil and rock particles, said Paul Ziemkiewicz, director of the West Virginia Water Research Institute.

After the coal is cleansed, the leftover mixtures of chemicals and mud are piped to slurry ponds, where much of the chemical mixture is stored until reused.

Even as the National Guard made plans to mobilize at an air base at Charleston’s Yeager Airport, many people weren’t waiting for outside help.

After officials announced the tap water ban Thursday, residents stripped store shelves in many areas of items such as bottled water, paper cups and bowls.

As many as 50 customers had lined up Thursday night to buy water at a convenience store near Charleston.

“It was chaos, that’s what it was,” cashier Danny Cardwell said.

Officials focused on getting water to people who needed it, particularly the elderly and disabled.

At least one charity was collecting donations of bottled water, baby wipes, plastic utensils and other items for people unable to use tap water.

Inside a local Kroger grocery store, there were signs that the chemical spills had affected business. Anything that used water — from the deli counter to the produce section — was either closed or had a limited supply.

Outside the restrooms, a handmade sign told the story: Because of a chemical spill in the Elk River, the store was advising people not to use the water fountain. The bathroom sinks were wrapped in plastic.

Robert Stiver was unable to find water at that store after trying at least a dozen others in the area and worried about how he'd make sure his cats had drinkable water. The water at his home had a blue tint and smelled like licorice, he said.

"I'm lucky. I can get out and look for water. But what about the elderly? They can't get out. They need someone to help them," he said.

That's what 59-year-old Dan Scott was doing: Taking care of his 81-year-old mother, Bonnie Wireman, and others in the area.

"She takes everything to heart. She forgot a few times and stuck her hand in the kitchen sink. When she realized what she did, she took out alcohol and washed her hands. Scrubbed them. She was really scared," he said.

Al Jazeera and wire services

Update: this article has been modified to correct the affiliation of Elizabeth Scharman, who has never been affiliated with American Water. Rather, she is the Director of the West Virginia Poison Center.