\u201cYesterday morning, it was 77 degrees when we backed out. It\u2019s been averaging about a degree an hour increasing, so that\u2019s the bad news,\u201d he said in a short video posted on social media.<\/p>\n
He said firefighters are seeking ways to cool the tank. Aerial footage filmed by local TV stations showed jets of water being sprayed at the tank, which has a capacity of 128,700 litres.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe primary focus is the tanks,\u201d Covey said during a press conference. \u201cWe\u2019re continuing to keep them cool and monitor them.\u201d<\/p>\n
A blast zone map released by the Orange County Fire Authority showed areas within about 335m of the tank would sustain severe damage in the event of an explosion, and about the same distance from that radius could experience light damage.<\/p>\n
Authorities initially described the tank exploding or rupturing as the only possible outcomes, but Covey said: \u201cLetting this thing just fail and blow up is unacceptable\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur goal is to find something and not allow that to happen, not to let it damage our community, not let it damage our environment.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added that residents had followed directions to evacuate and the only people at risk now were the emergency responders.<\/p>\n
\u2018Diking and damming\u2019<\/p>\n
Orange County Health Officer Regina Chinsio-Kwong said the large exclusion zone around the tank was a necessary precaution.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it does explode and there is a vapour, you are all safe as long as you are out of the zone that was determined to be an evacuation zone,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
No injuries had been reported and there was no immediate indication as to what caused the leak, which was initially reported on Thursday local time.<\/p>\n
Responders were working to put containment barriers in place to prevent any spilled material from reaching storm drains or river channels that funnel into the ocean.<\/p>\n
The US Environmental Protection Agency says methyl methacrylate is irritating to the skin, eyes, and mucous membranes in humans.<\/p>\n
\u201cRespiratory effects have been reported in humans following acute (short-term) and chronic (long-term) inhalation exposures,\u201d a fact sheet on the agency\u2019s website says.<\/p>\n
\u201cNeurological symptoms have also been reported in humans following acute exposure.\u201d<\/p>\n
– AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cYesterday morning, it was 77 degrees when we backed out. It\u2019s been averaging about a degree an hour…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":442800,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[16745,6127,1975,179,226192,74217,31515,12688,36662,80495,40737,28164,7572,679,305,42,47037,78,43,1118,801,7192,14931,13939,15454,1361,2742,40,38,41,39,45356,8222],"class_list":["post-442799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-adding","tag-already","tag-at","tag-california","tag-californians","tag-catastrophic","tag-chemical","tag-chemicals","tag-evacuate","tag-exploding","tag-explosion","tag-fears","tag-firefighters","tag-forced","tag-have","tag-headlines","tag-heating","tag-in","tag-news","tag-of","tag-rising","tag-risk","tag-tank","tag-temperature","tag-tens","tag-that","tag-thousands","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-toxic","tag-warned"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442799\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/442800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}