On
5/19/2026, a three-alarm fire occurred at the Metech Recycling facility in Salt
Lake City, Utah, which is involved in electronics recycling. The Salt Lake City Fire Department extinguished the fire with water by approximately 9 pm that evening. Runoff mixed with ash from burned
electronics waste and water from firefighting activities migrated off-site via storm
drains/ditches and reportedly entered the City Drain West Canal located east of
the Salt Lake City International Airport; City Drain West Canal eventually
flows into Farmington Bay and the Great Salt Lake. Salt Lake City Public Utilities reported a fish kill in the City Drain West Canal.
On 5/21/2026 an EPA Region 8 On-Scene Coordinator (OSC) mobilized to assess the incident and provide sampling support to Utah Department of Environmental Quality (UDEQ) per request. The OSC met with state, facility, and insurance company representatives to assess the situation and discuss cleanup efforts. Facility representatives are cleaning up and containerizing the outdoor ash and debris remaining onsite for proper disposal; in addition, facility representatives are working with officials from Salt Lake City to clean out the impacted sewer drains leading to City Drain West Canal.
Based on the assessment of City Drain West Canal and coordination with personnel from UDEQ and the Salt Lake City Public Utilities, the OSC directed EPA contractor START to collect one round of surface water samples from the City Drain West Canal for laboratory analysis of volatile organic compounds (VOC), semi-volatile organic compounds (SVOC), metals and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH). Subsequent rounds of surface water samples will be collected by UDEQ.
