HUNTINGTON BEACH : Toxic Medical Waste Dumped; 2 Sought

Police and fire officials are looking for two men in a van who dumped about 10 gallons of toxic medical waste into a dumpster behind a shopping center Tuesday, causing three workers to be hospitalized, a fire official said Wednesday.

The two men dumped a household waste can full of pathological human tissue and body fluids into a trash bin at the Seacliff Village shopping center on Main Street between Golden West and Yorktown avenues, Fire Department spokeswoman Martha Worth said.

Investigators have not yet determined the specific contents of the material, which they described as waste commonly generated from medical centers involved with biopsies, childbirth and other procedures.

The stench from the waste was so severe that four maintenance and landscaping workers at the center became ill, Worth said. Three of the employees were treated for acute nausea and given blood tests at Pacifica Hospital in Huntington Beach, she said. They were released late Tuesday.

The rancid blob was cleaned up and removed by city hazardous-materials crews, and they reported it posed no health risk to neighborhood residents, she said.

“Some of these guys who have dealt with dead bodies and all sorts of other things said they have never smelled anything with such a nasty stench,” Worth said.

Medical centers typically hire companies to collect and dispose of such materials.

The city’s only similar incident in recent years occurred when a truck owned by a medical-waste disposal company was involved in a traffic accident, spilling a load of the waste onto the street, Worth said. “But we’ve never had an illegal dumping like this,” she said.

Witnesses said the two suspects were driving a late-model white Chevrolet van, with green interior carpeting, when they dumped the plastic can full of waste at about 10 a.m. Tuesday. The license number witnesses reported did not match the vehicle, investigators said.

Investigators are asking anyone with information to call the Huntington Beach Fire Department at 536-5411.