School ‘Prank’ Injures 26 : Chlorine Gas Empties Rooms at Dana Hills

An apparent prank on the last day of school spread a cloud of toxic chlorine gas through the main building of a Dana Point high school Wednesday, injuring 26 students and adults and prompting the evacuation of the campus.

Officials said the gas was the result of brake fluid mixed with chlorine tablets in a trash can at Dana Hills High School. The incident occurred as students took their final exams, less than a hour before classes were due to end for the summer.

Eleven students and five teachers and staff members were taken to three hospitals suffering from upper respiratory ailments. The two most seriously injured were female students, listed in fair condition. The rest were treated and released.

Firefighters said they treated 10 other people at the scene.

“I guess this was someone’s idea of a prank, but it’s more serious than a prank,” said Dana Hills Principal John Smart. “I’d like to think they did not intend harm,” Smart said, as students and teachers were given oxygen nearby, and their heart rates and blood pressure were checked.

About 40 Orange County firefighters turned the high school parking lot into an emergency treatment center and set up decontamination baths, stripping and scrubbing the injured behind curtains of yellow plastic held up by assistants, then loading the victims into ambulances.

Fire Department Battalion Chief Ron Blaul said chlorine gas is a respiratory irritant that can kill if inhaled in substantial enough quantities. In smaller amounts, it can cause chemical burning of the lungs, he said.

Firefighters wearing full respiratory gear also rescued a nine-foot boa constrictor and a four-foot iguana from the science lab after all the people were treated. The reptiles also had to undergo a decontamination bath, Blaul said.

The gas cloud forced the evacuation of about half of the school’s 2,290 students. The rest were in portable classrooms that were not affected by the fumes.

Orange County Fire Department spokesman John Hamilton characterized the incident as “some sort of bad practical joke.”

The incident occurred shortly after 11 a.m. inside “the mall,” a two-story, rectangular building with school offices, theater and classrooms around the perimeter. The center of the building is an atrium-like enclosed area with a two-story ceiling with skylights.

The chemicals were inside and next to a trash can near a stairwell by the theater, which is also called “the porthole.”

One staff member, a hall monitor who asked not to be identified, said she was walking through the mall when she saw smoke in a corner. She alerted the custodians and ran to get a jug of water, thinking the smoke was coming from a smoke bomb that could be easily extinguished.

As she ran to it, “it was so toxic, it was unbelievable,” she said. “It smelled like strong, strong chlorine. You knew it was really dangerous. It was scary.”

She said that despite the overpowering fumes, two custodians carried the trash can out of the building. In addition, one picked up some white powder on the floor, using a shirt or some piece of cloth to protect his hands, the staff member said.

“They were trying to get it (the gaseous material) out of the building. We had a building full of students,” she said.

Fire officials said they were alerted to the fumes at 11:16 a.m. A spokesman for the school district said classes were evacuated at 11:45 a.m. when smoke continued to waft into the building. Classes were scheduled to end at 12:26 p.m.

Students left final exams and belongings at their desks and filed outside.

Blaul said the trash can also held some burned material. It was not known whether the material was set on fire by someone or if heat generated by the mixed chemicals ignited the trash, he said.

There were no suspects in custody, though investigators were trying to track down an unnamed student for questioning, Blaul said. The Orange County Sheriff’s Department is assisting the investigation.

Hazardous material team members, wearing head-to-toe protective gear and full respiratory equipment, went into the building about 1 p.m. to cart out the chemical material for analysis. Blaul said the material resembled the residue of a burned road flare, spread over a 20-foot area. “It was described as a pile of yellowish goop,” Blaul said.

It was not until about 2 p.m., after the last of the victims had been treated and taken to hospitals, that firefighters determined that the fumes were chlorine gas, based on tests conducted at the site in the department’s portable lab.

Blaul said that the chlorine gas was created by mixing two chemicals and that an investigation would reveal what the chemicals were. He would not confirm that the fumes came from mixing brake fluid with chlorine tablets, as the school principal told teachers after conferring with fire officials. Blaul would only say that such a mixture would produce chlorine gas.

However, Fire Department spokesman Hamilton said the incident occurred when a fire in the trash can burned some chlorine tablets mixed with brake fluid.

School officials planned to reopen the building today to allow students to recover their belongings.

The incident produced incongruous scenes on the last day of school. While firefighters administered oxygen to the victims, only yards away other students were giddily signing each other’s yearbook and hugging goodby for the summer.

All but the two most seriously injured victims were treated and released from area hospitals. The two remained in Mission Hospital Regional Medical Center. A spokeswoman said six students, all females ages 15 and 16, were brought in, and four were treated and released. She refused to release their names.

The first two victims taken from the scene were rushed by paramedics to San Clemente General Hospital with what Fire Department spokesmen said were moderate injuries. However, a spokesman for the hospital said a total of five people were treated at the hospital, and all were released after treatment. They were identified as Arthur Smith, 44, a vice principal; student Rochelle Richardson, 14; custodian Jose Gonzales, 29; teacher Josephine Hanson, 57, and teacher Rebecca Tice, 30.

At South Coast Medical Center in South Laguna, five were treated and released. They were Dirk Noel, 17, Geraldine Cirlani, 14, and Michael Fournier, all students; Rodger Harrison, 25, a maintenance worker, and Robert Riggs, 36, a teacher.

Staff writers Bill Billiter and George Frank contributed to this report.