Strange Chemical Makes Students Sick : Environment: Children waiting for bus in Oceanside suddenly get burning eyes, skin. No one knows what caused it.

A mysterious airborne chemical breezed through a school bus stop Friday, sending 53 Oceanside children and a school health worker to area hospitals where they were treated and released after complaining of burning eyes, throats and skin.

Nearly 100 firefighters and other emergency officials scoured the bus stop area, on Hacienda Drive between Tropicana and Riviera drives, looking for the cause of the sickness. But the chemical had quickly dissipated, leaving no clues about its substance or origin.

“We believe from the evidence and symptoms that it was a release, whether accidental or on purpose, of some agent similar to Mace or tear gas,” said Battalion Chief Hank Thompson of the Oceanside Fire Department.

The students, all seventh and eighth graders, were flocking to the stop shortly before 9 a.m. to await the bus for Jefferson Junior High School when they were suddenly stricken by the invisible chemical.

“Kids were sick when I got there. Five of them were running home crying, their eyes were red,” said Chris Toluao, 12. “I walked up and my eyes started burning and itching just like that,” he said, snapping his fingers. “A friend of mine told me they turned red.”

Another student, Damien Rogers, waited a short time at the bus stop before he started getting a headache and nausea.

“You could kind of smell gas. . . . It wasn’t heavy, it was a small odor,” said Rogers, 13. “I felt like I had to throw up.”

Oceanside spokesman Larry Bauman said “kids complained of smelling something like chili or red pepper.”

Seven students raced to nearby San Luis Rey Elementary School to seek medical assistance and were soon taken to hospitals for treatment. A school health clerk, Diane Petersen, became ill when she ventured to the bus stop to investigate the problem.

Meanwhile, 46 other students who waited at the bus stop continued on to Jefferson School but reported feeling sick when they arrived.

“Everybody complained their eyes stung. Some kids said their faces tingled. Others said they had headaches or their stomachs felt funny,” said Dan Armstrong, spokesman for the Oceanside Unified School District.

Jefferson School officials promptly had the students transported to area hospitals by school bus. “We just took no chances,” Armstrong said.

The 53 Jefferson students were taken to Tri-City Medical Center in Oceanside, Fallbrook Hospital, Naval Hospital at Camp Pendleton and Scripps Memorial Hospital in Encinitas.

By late afternoon, the hospitals reported that all students had been treated and released to their parents. No one suffered permanent injury, according to Dr. Stephen Karas, who treated 37 children at Tri-City Medical Center.

Most felt “irritable, burning itchiness of the face and irritable burning eyes,” he said. “Initially, some students had some tearing, but not by the time they saw us. The symptoms gradually improved over time.”

At the hospitals, students had their eyes washed out and their skin cleaned with soap.

“They took our blood pressure, checked our eyes and put liquid drops in them,” said Salvador Sandoval, an eighth-grader. “By the time I left, I felt better.”

After the treatment at Tri-City, the students were treated to lunch. “Crackers, cheese, soda, tuna sandwiches, cookies, juice, fruit--it was great,” Sandoval said.

Although Jefferson School students took the brunt of the chemical exposure, five San Luis Rey students who simply walked by the bus stop on their way to school complained of irritation. Their eyes were flushed out by school health authorities and hospital treatment wasn’t needed.

“It was scary,” schools spokesman Armstrong said. “What made it scary was the lack of knowledge what substance the kids could have been exposed to.”

While students were being treated, emergency crews and government officials were combing the area by the bus stop, which is alongside vacant property beneath high-tension power lines, a short distance from homes and businesses off of Mission Avenue in Oceanside’s eastern side.

There was a bustling mix of firefighters, police, city officials, members of the San Diego Fire Department’s Hazardous Response Team, and a crew from the county’s Hazardous Materials Management Division. Parents and area residents also milled around.

Authorities searched sewers, storm drains, homes and businesses but were unable to determine the source of the chemical.

Battalion Chief Thompson said, “we’re continuing to investigate,” but he held little hope that authorities would learn what the chemical was, where it came from, and whether it was accidentally or deliberately released.

The chemical “very slowly moved through the area,” Thompson said. “Unfortunately, that was the time kids were collecting” at the bus stop.

Nick Vent, a hazardous materials specialist with the county, said, “We sniffed around with some of our high-tech instrumentation . . . (but) we came up blank. It’s technically what we call a transient odor.”

A slight westerly breeze blew the chemical along, and authorities believe that the substance, which lingered at the bus stop from a few minutes to 20 minutes according to various accounts, moved on or dissipated in the air.

Times staff writers Jonathan Gaw and Tom Gorman contributed to this report.