Open the windows. Turn on the air conditioner. Walk the dog. The word from the Columbia County Emergency Operations Center, or at least what I could gather from the radio broadcast, is that the crisis is over. Apparently no PCBs were found in the air that was tested, what burned were mostly petroleum products (although there was a small drum of PSBs on the site), and the fire is now 99 percent out. In terms of health risks, the public was assured that "this fire was not all that much different from other fires," but the county took a "proactive and conservative approach" to ensure public safety.
Sam Pratt has just published on his blog: "Notes on 1:30 pm news conference about TCI."
PCBs often turn into dioxins and furans when burned at high temperatures, and those are both more toxic than PCBs. A report on the presence of other compounds (such as dioxins) is supposed to be available tomorrow. --S.
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