JAMESTOWN-Employees at The Connection told WNYNewsNow they smelled “old hair dye” as they rushed out of the old Furniture Mart Building in downtown Jamestown Thursday morning.
As of 2:30 pm fire officials were still parked in front of 111 W. 2nd St. where a leaking HVAC system forced the evacuation of hundreds of people earlier in the day.
Deputy Chief Chet Harvey told reporter’s a triage area was established where 30 people were treated for various symptoms related to the leak.
No word on when the establishment will reopen or when the cleanup will be completed.
See related post: HVAC Leak Forces Evacuation Of Downtown Building; 19 People Treated, 11 Others Transported To WCA
Just received an email from the corporate office stating the center will be closed tonight, but should reopen tomorrow. Paychecks will be distributed as usual tomorrow.
There is no cleanup to an HVAC leak. It would have been a gas leak from the furnace (most likely a rusted hear exchanger). Gas would have been shut off to the unit, and workers would have been able to return the next day.
How do you know it wasn’t a refrigerant leak from a chiller
In the city chillers are on the roof. Compressors are inside the chiller, so if it did leak refrigerant no-one would know until the chilled water or glycol mix got hot and the building started to get hot.
Agreed, but if its got a chiller, the likelihood of it having a conventional furnace is unlikely…larger buildings will have a boiler and as such, no CO is gonna leak into s/a thru cracked heat exchanger…if a refrigerant leak happens on the roof and is drawn in thru fresh air intake i could see how this could happen…had a huge compressor burn up and blow the terminal plug once on a large building, just so happened to be right next to a large fresh air intake damper…you could smell the phosgene throughout the entire 6 story building.