Officials looking for link between dead fish, fire

By Associated Press

ELIZABETHTON, Tenn. -- State wildlife officials removed hundreds of dead fish from the Watauga River yesterday while trying to determine whether the kill was related to a nearby factory fire.

The dead fish started surfacing about noon Friday, more than seven hours after the fire began at a plant operated by North American Corp., which makes fibers for car hoses.

Some residents reported seeing a thick layer of foam flowing down the river, prompting tests by the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation and Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency.

Officials suspect a link between the fish kill and the fire, which was expected to smolder for several days. But they said it posed no health threat to residents in Elizabethton or nearby Johnson City, which gets about three-fourths of its water from the river.

"As far as impact to the water, we're getting normal results from testing," Sullivan County Emergency Management Agency director Jerry Fleenor said.

The Tennessee Valley Authority reduced dam flows from the Watauga and Wilbur dams for several hours Friday as a precaution to protect the drinking water. Johnson City stopped the intake into its water treatment plant after seeing foam in the river but resumed normal operations yesterday.

Meanwhile, firefighters continued battling several "hot spots" at the plant, probably delaying an investigation until the fire is extinguished. The blaze destroyed at least half the 1.3 million-squarefoot plant, Fleenor said.

As a precaution, firefighters also continued moving the roughly 5 million pounds of chlorine being stored at the plant by Dow Chemical.

The chemical is toxic and may be fatal if inhaled or absorbed through the skin. Officials initially worried that the chlorine would release poisonous vapors if wet, but they later learned that is not a danger with the type of chlorine stored there.

An evacuation plan was ready for the 13,000 residents of this Carter County town, including nearby Sycamore Shoals Hospital, but Fleenor said officials were unlikely to take that action.

North American Corp. contracts with General Motors and Ford Motor Co. to make fibers for car hoses, said company president Charles Green.

The plant once manufactured rayon for NASA and rayon- and latex-treated yarns. Layoffs and production changes in 1997 reduced the work force from 1,300 to about 100 people, Green said.

http://www.tennessean.com/sii/00/02/27/plantfire27.shtml