Sometime near the end of September 2004, four individuals broke into a building on Tidewater Ave. in Pawtucket, Rhode Island which housed liquid mercury being collected from gas regulators for either reclamation or disposal. The building is owned by the New England Gas Company, but was not properly marked or permitted. At least one container was broken in the building resulting in mercury on the floor. An unknown amount was taken back to an apartment complex where two of the individuals lived.
On October 22, 2004, mercury was discovered in the parking lot of the complex. Local and state officials and representatives of the gas company and their contractors responded that day to the scene, and the building where the individuals lived was monitored for mercury. Due to elevated levels of mercury in the indoor air, residents of the building were immediately relocated to a nearby hotel. EPA and their Superfund Technical Assessment and Response Team (START) contractor were on-scene the following morning and assisted the RI Department of Environmental Management (DEM) in monitoring the remaining four buildings in the complex. Due to elevated levels, the residents of one of those buildings were relocated that day. Levels in the other three buildings were in a number of instances higher than the recommended action level for indoor residential air (1 microgram per cubic meter), but substantially less than the other two buildings. The contractor for the gas company confirmed those results the following day, October 24. Consensus was reached among the responding agencies that the residents from the remaining apartments also be relocated. That was accomplished on Monday, October, 25, 2004, bringing the total of evacuated apartment units to 53.
New England Gas Company has hired a number of consultants, industrial hygienists, and a cleanup contractor to fully assess and remediate the apartments and parking lot area. They are also assessing and if necessary, remediating all of the outlying elements including schools, school busses, personal vehicles and any family members or friends who might have been at any of the apartments. The gas company is also working with a number of human services organizations to house, feed, and clothe the relocated individuals and to appropriately deal with their ancillary needs.
