Guest Viewpoint: Schools must protect against the threat of terrorism at nearby chemical facilities

By Fred Millar

1/22/02 – Los Angeles Unified School District officials sent a sobering Safety Gram to all schools in November pointing out a new risk following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. They advised schools to prepare not only for toxic materials released inside a school, but for toxic airborne releases "outside [or] released in the surrounding community."

Many worry that terrorists will choose their next targets from the explosive and toxic chemical facilities or chemical rail tank cars that are all around us.

Schools across the nation are located within the explosion or gas cloud "vulnerable zones" of nearby chemical facilities or transportation lines. But many people don't know about it, because local officials don't want to alarm the public.

Toxic gas clouds have in the past invaded schools and injured students, revealing large gaps in schools' capacities to deal with serious chemical releases.

No data exists on how often this happens, but newspaper coverage nationwide has shown fearful, weeping students and teachers evacuating their schools. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) is introducing legislation calling upon schools to beef up their emergency planning.

On a CNN documentary aired in December called "What Next?", Mayor Martin O'Malley of Baltimore said it is very difficult to get private companies to erect security fences around railroad chemical tank cars, often stored for months in densely populated communities. City fire prevention officials asserted there are at least eight sites in the city where railcars are stored without any serious security measures.

Washington, D.C., officials in December reportedly hauled away in the dark of night, under guard, the 10 pressurized chlorine gas tank cars previously sitting at the Blue Plains sewage treatment plant and substituted a different sewage disinfection process for the old chlorine gas process.

A chemical facility or rail line need not be within eyesight of a school to pose a danger. According to the Chlorine Institute, a deadly toxic cloud from just one chlorine tank car could extend 14.8 miles in whatever direction the wind is blowing. Worst-case scenario maps posted on the Internet by chemical plants in Augusta, Ga., show toxic gas clouds stretching three to 15 miles.

We cannot take an ostrich-like strategy of ignoring these possible threats. While managers of chemical facilities try to keep their riskiest chemicals contained, terrorists would aim to release them to cause the most harm to Americans.

Since boards of education bear the ultimate responsibility for protecting students, it is up to them to engage the community in a full and complete understanding of and preparation for what was formerly unthinkable.

Many school districts are doing this. In New York state, for example, all schools must have emergency management plans and school safety plans that cover chemical spills, as well as ice storms, bomb threats, and student violence.

Fairfax County, Va., public school officials for the first time are mapping the location of the county's 55 most hazardous facilities in correlation with nearby schools.

Chemical facilities can be hazardous, even without the threat of terrorism. An early wake-up call occurred Nov. 15, 1984, when an elementary school in Middleport, N.Y., was gassed with methyl isocyanate, the same deadly chemical that killed 3,000 and injured 10,000 in Bhopal, India, just weeks later.

The Middleport accident involved a ground-hugging cloud of the chemical released at 9:00 a.m. at an FMC Corp. facility located only 400 yards from the school. The principal was able to shut off the ventilation system that was bringing the gas inside. But the children, many with breathing difficulties, were not finally evacuated until 10:50 a.m.

The bungling of the emergency response, involving ill-informed doctors, hospitals, and health officials, is a sobering lesson.

Nine children and two adults were taken to the hospital. No one died, fortunately, but a toxicologist later suggested that if the day had been 20 degrees warmer, the toxic gas exposures would have led to many deaths.

School officials need to discuss with nearby chemical facility managers the possible range of an accidental toxic cloud release, find out how an alarm would be made, and learn under what conditions they should keep students in place and when to evacuate.

School boards might think they don't have to deal with these issues because local emergency planning committees (LEPCs) have already done this. They would be wrong. The 4,100 LEPCs in the U.S. are voluntary and usually unfunded and unstaffed. Federal studies have shown that the vast majority have been unwilling even to communicate risk to the public.

School officials need to take the following action steps, which are based on current mainstream public policy on accident prevention and emergency planning:

• Initiate a rough screening and mapping exercise to determine schools with populations at potential risk of industrial chemical release.

Several sources can be used, including local emergency planning committee documents and risk management plans for local chemical facilities. The federal Environmental Protection Agency has a Web site that can provide a rough estimate of whether a school, home, or other building is within the danger zone of a nearby hazardous facility.

• Initiate a dialogue on hazards with local facility managers, fire chiefs, and emergency management officials.

• Identify which chemicals are of greatest concern, and work with a sample of perhaps 10 types of releases that could occur with one or more chemicals. Determine the worst case scenario involving the farthest distance that gas clouds could spread.

• Initiate a dialogue on possible risk elimination or risk reduction options, especially in urgent situations with facilities that might be likely targets, such as oil refineries. Assess each facility's security and secondary containment measures.

• Begin the emergency planning process by assessing the community, facility, and school alert systems. Assess schools' ventilation systems to see if and how a gas cloud can be kept out of the school.

• Consider communications issues. What will you do if parents rush to schools to pick up their children?

• Consider transportation issues. If children are evacuated, where should they go? How can a cloud be avoided? How long will an evacuation take?

• Plan field drills or other activities to identify gaps in preparedness. A comprehensive dialogue should include relevant stakeholders, such as parents, staff, PTA leaders, teacher associations, and local environmentalists who might know how to use the federal right-to-know policy tools made available after the Bhopal disaster.

* A new focus on external risks is likely to reinforce school officials' motivation to reduce the risks and hazards associated with chemicals kept on site. Do they have a current inventory and plan to dispose of mercury, pesticides, formaldehyde, or other toxic, flammable, or explosive chemicals?

Schools can often switch to less-toxic maintenance and instructional supplies–and possibly get a lower premium from their insurance company.

There are many measures we can take to protect ourselves and our children to lower the risks from accidents or terrorism at nearby chemical facilities. Emergency planning and risk reduction cannot be done competently without an appropriate level of concern and involvement from those most at risk.

Fred Millar served for 10 years on the District of Columbia Local Emergency Planning Committee and is currently a consultant to local officials on chemical accident prevention.