By STAN MADDUX

Indiana Correspondent

WAUKEGAN, Ill. — Charges will not be filed in connection with the April 25 spill of anhydrous ammonia that put 37 people, including close to a dozen Chicago area firefighters, in a hospital.

No deaths resulted from the spill, but seven people inhaling vapors from a cloud forming when the chemical leaked were admitted in critical condition. Everyone has since been released from the hospital, said Chris Covelli, spokesman for the Lake County Sheriff’s Office north of Chicago.

Authorities said no laws were broken. “While the conduct of the work may have been negligent, it didn’t rise of the level of criminal conduct,” said Lake County State’s Attorney Michael Nerheim.

According to authorities, a tractor was pulling tanks of anhydrous ammonia from Wisconsin to an Illinois farm before sunrise. Investigators ruled the chemical fertilizer leaked through open valves on the tanks on Green Bay Road in a heavily populated area north of Chicago’s downtown.

The hovering vapor cloud triggered a several-hours evacuation within a one-mile radius of the leak. Covelli said it appears from the preliminary findings the driver failed to close the valves before he left with the tanks and, while driving, a tube connected to the tanks became dislodged, causing the leak.

Bill Field, an agricultural safety expert at Purdue University, said the leak points to a need by some farmers using the chemical fertilizer to protect themselves financially in the event of a mishap.

Under Indiana law, he said distributors must have drivers certified in hauling the chemical and trained in emergency response to deliver the product. Farmers can do the hauling themselves, though, as long the driver is affiliated with their operation.

Field, who has worked cases involving other serious injury anhydrous ammonia mishaps during his 40-year career, said farmers doing their own hauling don’t always use vehicles best suited for transporting the heavy tanks. He cited a case in Indiana where tanks of ammonia fastened to a utility-sized pickup truck pulled off the rear bumper while going down the road.

Field also said light trucks doing the hauling don’t always have the braking power to stop in a timely fashion because of the weight of the tanks. The tires on a light truck can also be too small to hold up under the weight of the ammonia.

“In states like Indiana, I can send my own 16-year-old kid in a Dodge Dakota that weighs 2,800 pounds and hook up a tank of ammonia that probably weighs 11,000 or 12,000 pounds,” he explained.

Such practices, although legal in some states, does not mean farmers can’t be held financially responsible for an accident. In a civil lawsuit, he said farmers could well lose everything, given the potential for heavy losses from injury in chemical fertilizer accidents.

“My concern is, do farmers realize their liability?” Field asked.

In a farm safety video released by the Illinois Department of Agriculture and the Illinois Fertilizer & Chemical Assoc., anhydrous ammonia is cited as continuing to be in high demand as an essential source of nitrogen for crops despite tightening regulations and “soaring liability costs.” Exposure can result in serious short- and long-term health problems, like burning of the eyes and lungs and even death, according to the video.

“I have a feeling that this case outside Chicago with 30-plus people treated, some of them with severe lung burns who were first responders, there’s going to be millions of dollars that will change hands to pay for that and it’s going to come from insurance companies. It’s going to come from a variety of sources,” Field said.

He said anhydrous ammonia-related mishaps being rare could be a reason laws governing transport of the chemical not tightening in some locations. “I would say there’s a position of ‘let’s not worry about it yet’ because the consequences have not been that significant,” he said.

When accidents happen, though, the outcome – as near Chicago – can be devastating because of urban sprawl. “We have tanks of ammonia being transported right through suburban housing developments to get to those 50-acre pieces still being farmed, with the intent that within five years they’re going to have houses on them. But they’re still farming them, so in order to get to them they have to drive the equipment to these neighborhoods.”

Field said some heavily populated areas like Indianapolis do not allow for anhydrous ammonia to be transported on some of their highways, to guard against the potential for such a major calamity.

Covelli said the name of the driver is not being released due to charges not being filed in the case. He did say the man was 59 years old and worked at the farm to which he was taking the chemicals.