ZAMBOANGA CITY—A toxic gas leak at an ice plant here sickened more than 100 villagers, including children, sending them to different hospitals and prompting authorities to call for an investigation.
The leak, believed to be of ammonia, started late Wednesday and lasted until yesterday.
The city mayor, Celso Lobregat, immediately ordered an investigation of the leak that village officials said came from an ice plant in one village here, Barangay Ayala.
Residents of the village reported smelling foul odor starting late Wednesday. The continued exposure to the odor caused many villagers to have difficulty breathing and exhibit other symptoms of poisoning.
Elvira Porras, a resident of Barangay Ayala, said villagers started to smell what they believed was ammonia about 10 p.m. on Wednesday.
“My eyes were red and hurting. I was already crying,” Porras said.
Porras said when she and her children went out of the house, they learned that their neighbors were also suffering from vomiting and difficulty in breathing.
“It was like we were poisoned,” she said.
City Councilor Cesar “Jawo” Jimenez, who lives in the village, said the leak came from the ice plant.
He said it was “initially tolerable.” But “it got stronger by the minute and we suffered difficulty in breathing.”
Jimenez said the sheer number of people who were sickened by the odor overwhelmed a local health clinic that its staff told residents seeking medication to go to other health facilities.
He said other residents fled their homes as soon as the gas leak was noted. At least a thousand people sought refuge at a gymnasium in the village, Jimenez said.
Lobregat said villagers who fled the gas leak had returned home but some victims are still in hospitals.
Diosterides Librero, chair of Barangay Ayala, said the ice plant owner, Ismael Tan, had offered help for the victims.
“We are fortunate that no one got seriously ill or is in serious condition,” Librero said.
Mayor Lobregat said an investigation was needed “to determine who are culpable and should be made answerable for the gas leak.”
He said he has ordered the office of the city environment and natural resources and the Environmental Management Bureau of the DENR to conduct the investigation.
The Inquirer was told that environment officials who had conducted an initial investigation found that workers at the ice plant were cleaning the facility’s pipes before the gas leak. Julie Alipala, Inquirer Mindanao