Council hears question from resident related to recent Civic Centre ammonia leak incident

The ammonia leak incident at the Civic Centre earlier this month made
for a short discussion topic at Monday's City Council Session

An industrial incident at the city's recreation centre from earlier this month made for a question from the public at Monday's Prince Rupert City Council session, with a city resident taking advantage of the Committee of the Whole process to inquire as to the status of a review of the ammonia leak at the Prince Rupert Civic Centre on July .

Mr. Larry Golden, a frequent contributor at City Council sessions offered up his question to Mayor Lee Brain at the start of Monday's council session, asking if the city was conducting a review of the incident and if any reports related to the incident were going be made public.

City Manager Robert Long fielded the question for staff, noting that there was an investigation underway and that a report would be generated, but also noting that whether it would be made public would remain to be seen.

"We're investigating at this point and we'll have a report come forward, whether or not its public or not will have to remain to be seen, but at the moment we're investigating" -- City Manager Robert Long on the nature of the city's investigation into an incident at the Prince Rupert Civic Centre in early July.

You can review the short question and answer session as part of the City's Video Archive starting at the very beginning of Monday's council Session.




The incident in question took place in the late afternoon of Wednesday July 4th, with the report of the ammonia leak at the facility being made at 4:30.

As part of the response to the incident emergency response were dispatched to the Civic Centre, evacuating the facility, with RCMP members blocking access to the area, while Fire/Rescue members addressed the emergency at the site.

As a result of the incident two members of the public were transported to Prince Rupert Regional Hospital for treatment and  subsequently released.

The all clear for the facility was issued later in the evening of the 4th and the Civic Centre was back in use by Thursday morning.

Wednesday ammonia incident at Recreation Centre requires more info for public
Prince Rupert Fire/Rescue responds to incident at Civic Centre, with reports of an ammonia leak at Arena

As part of the incident response, Worksafe BC was called in for an investigation of the events related to the July 5th incident and while Worksafe BC does not identify its case files by community, the most recent listings from their investigation files does seem to indicate some preliminary notes of their work in Prince Rupert.

With Worksafe BC providing for a short update on an  exposure to ammonia related incident at a public facility in Northern British Columbia, now available on their website.

The synopsis below outlines the nature of the incident that was investigated and some background into the cause, however no indication of  any recommendations or other measures for follow up are included in the short update.

More items of note related to Monday's City council session can be found from our Council Timeline, while a wider overview of City Council Discussion topics can be reviewed here.


Cross posted from the North Coast Review.