A MAN has been charged on suspicion of possessing an explosive which led to the prolonged evacuation of around 50 houses in Sheffield.

Police said the 34-year-old man is facing charges on two counts of possessing an explosive, after chemicals were found at a property on Ridgehill Avenue, Intake.

They said the substances, discovered on Thursday, were consistent with those used in the production of class A drugs and explosives.

The suspect, who lives on Ridgehill Avenue, has been remanded in custody.

A second man in his 60s arrested in relation to the incident was released on police bail until June, pending further enquiries.

BOMB squad officers carried out a controlled explosion this afternoon after police discovered chemicals in a Sheffield office.

Ridgehill Avenue, Intake, Sheffield, was shut for hours yesterday when police discovered chemicals relating to drug production.

The avenue was cordoned off for a second time this morning when more substances were discovered during a follow-up search.
...
“Police had previously found chemicals at the address and the controlled explosion took place to safely dispose of these substances from the property.

“Earlier this morning a number of neighbouring properties were evacuated as a precautionary measure, as the public’s safety is paramount to officers.

“A 34-year-old man has been arrested for allegedly attempting to produce class A drugs, he has subsequently been arrested under the explosives act.

The number of meth manufacturing cases in Kansas rose 43 percent last year, but the jump hasn’t alarmed state law enforcement officials.

Deputy KBI Director Kyle Smith said a part of the increase — from 143 incidents in 2010 to 204 in 2011 — was the result of a change in the way reports are counted. The 17 incidents reported after Jan. 31, 2011, would have gone into the 2012 total under the old system of reporting, he said.

And while the raw numbers are still up, he said, the operations that were uncovered by law enforcement officers last year were generally smaller than the ones that were commonly found in previous years. He said a review of the 2011 cases found that more than 40 percent were “one-pot” operations that involved much smaller amounts of meth than are found in traditional meth-making operations.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - A 25-year-old man suffered burns after a house explosion in Louisville's Butchertown neighborhood.
According to the Louisville Fire Department, the injured man was responsible for the explosion.

Louisville firefighters found fire and haze on the upper floor and outside they discovered structural damage to the back of the building. Because of the volatile chemicals involved in meth production, firefighters initially backed out of the building, which houses four apartment units.

“We started treating it as a meth lab situation,” said Louisville Fire Department Capt. Salvador Melendez.

After further investigating, they discovered it wasn't a meth lab, but was instead a marijuana-drying operation. Officials said more than a pound of marijuana was discovered.

Virginia Commonwealth University police and the Richmond Police Department, Richmond Fire, Richmond Ambulance and the HAZMAT team are at 10th and Leigh Streets on the VCU MCV campus.
The scene is at the campus residence hall complex known as Warner Rudd Bear and McRae Halls. The dorms were evacuated, said VCU, when campus police found unidentified compounds, liquids and glassware in a student’s dorm room.
VCU Police Chief John Venuti said that Tyler Hendon, 27, was arrested earlier Tuesday for possession of marijuana and a controlled substance, DMT.
During the course of the investigation, police executed a search warrant at Warner Hall, where Hendon lived downstairs, alone, on the main floor.
Our reporter on the scene said that the Drug Enforcement Administration suited up with masks and respirators and entered the building.
Mike Porter, spokesperson for VCU, said that air quality monitoring tests were performed, and materials were removed.
Venuti said that no evidence of “a functioning laboratory was found.”

Authorities are searching for two men who fled a suburban East Hemet home Wednesday afternoon during an inferno caused by a marijuana lab explosion.
Riverside County sheriff’s investigators determined burning marijuana chemicals set the blaze that destroyed a home at the corner of Acacia Avenue and Lake Street, in the unincorporated neighborhood of Little Lake.
The Sheriff’s Department Special Investigations Bureau issued a statement Thursday that said two men were seen fleeing after several explosions were heard just before 3:30 p.m. Wednesday.
Detectives believe the men were using a flammable substance to extract concentrated cannabis from marijuana plants in the garage. Evidence suggests a spark ignited the fumes, which caused an explosion and flames that consumed most of the home, according to the statement.
The fire also caused ammunition in the home to discharge and fire at the same time firefighters arrived.

TAMPA — An overwhelming chemical smell burned the eyes of inspectors Wednesday as they entered a warehouse to check on production of synthetic marijuana, the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office said.

The inspectors had come to take samples of the substance being processed at 6308 Benjamin Road, Suite 712, north of Tampa International Airport.

The sample would be sent to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to see if it contains any of the 29 compounds outlawed by the Legislature in its attempts to prevent the possession and sale of synthetic drugs.

But during the inspection, high levels of concentrated acetone caused investigators to call the state Fire Marshal, Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to evaluate the safety of the warehouse and its more than a dozen employees.

Specific combinations of chemicals make up the synthetic drugs that are banned in Florida. No arrests were made at the warehouse Wednesday while the case remains under investigation, said Larry McKinnon, a Sheriff's Office spokesman.

Deputies have been inspecting several local distribution centers, as well as local vendors, since Gov. Rick Scott signed the law on March 23 to expand the chemical compounds banned.

Unlike with other drugs, deputies can't perform on-site testing to determine if the compounds are illegal. And as the law changes to ban more chemical combinations, so do the manufacturer recipes to keep their businesses legal.

The bag of white powder that kicked off a hazmat scare after being found in a University of Virginia bathroom Thursday morning turned out to be cocaine, said Sgt. Darrell Byers of the Albemarle County police.

Dispatch records indicate the cocaine was found in a second floor women’s restroom in the Sheridan G. Snyder Translational Research Building and Fontaine Research Park.

The Charlottesville Fire Department’s regional hazmat team responded after the powder was found, confirmed Charlottesville Fire Chief Charles Werner in an email. After determining the substance wasn’t hazardous, fire officials turned the case over to the county police, according to Werner.

The amount of cocaine was relatively small, consistent with personal use rather than distribution, Byers said. He said investigators will have a tough time figuring out who left behind the cocaine.

A 55-year-old Los Osos resident was arrested on Thursday evening after an apparent attempt to convert some marijuana into hash oil in his kitchen went terribly wrong.
John Russell Odom remained in San Luis Obispo County Jail this afternoon on suspicion of manufacturing or converting a controlled substance through a chemical extraction process, a felony. Bail was set at $500,000.
Cmdr. Aaron Nix said sheriff’s deputies received a call about 7:50 p.m. Thursday after a loud explosion was heard by neighbors in the 2100 block of Ferrell Ave.
Deputies soon learned that Odom had been trying to convert some marijuana into hash oil, also called honey oil, in a process that involves butane. He did so inside his apartment with the windows closed, Nix said.
The lack of ventilation likely led to an explosion, blowing the glass sliding door near Odom’s kitchen off its frame.
Odom received some burns to his legs in the explosion, but no one else was present or injured. He was taken to a local hospital, treated and then released to sheriff’s deputies, who placed him under arrest, Nix said.

STURGIS (WKZO) -- The Sturgis Fire Department HazMat Team had to be called in after a chemical spill was reported following an explosion at an apartment building in the 1000-block of Cato Lane early Monday.  While firefighters evacuated the building, a spill was found in a hallway, and a quick investigation determined that the caustic chemical spilled was use din the production of meth.

After asking a few questions, a 20-year-old man and a 19-year-old woman, both from Sturgis, were arrested and charged with maintaining a drug house.  They were taken to the Sturgis City Jail where both posted bond and were released.

Officials began dismantling a crude residential ecstasy lab in Burnaby on the weekend after neighbours’ complaints about chemical smells led to a police raid on the operation.

Three people were arrested early Saturday when the RCMP’s Burnaby Drug Section and federal officers raided a home in the 100-block of Ellesmere Avenue, in Burnaby’s Capitol Hill area.

A specialized cleanup team in haz-mat suits was dismantling the lab, a job that could take up to three days to complete, police said.

Wearing pajamas and holding their breath against the gagging stench of a spill at the chemical plant two doors down, Victor and Theresa Flow fled their Jackson Street home on Jan. 5, 2002, and headed to the fresh air and shelter of a nearby hotel.

It wasn’t the first time a potentially toxic release from the Diaz Chemical Corp., a manufacturer of specialty chemicals for pharmaceutical and other industries, forced the elderly couple out of their house in the dead of night.

But it was the last.

More than a decade after the spill — and more than $10 million in federal toxic cleanup program money spent so far removing chemicals from the site — it is still unclear what, if any, long-term health hazards the company’s decades-long history of air and water pollution might pose to Holley residents.

LANCASTER--On Friday night just before 11:00p.m., a 31-year-old man was critically burned after a meth-lab explosion.

The Lancaster police and the Lancaster Fire Department were dispatched to the man's apartment on 180 Sells Road.

Officers were able to confirmed both a fire and an explosion had occurred in one of the apartments. 

The fire was contained to one room. 

Now that state authorities are stuck with the bill for cleaning up meth labs, they are looking for ways to cut costs and raise money to help pay for disposal of the toxic and potentially explosive chemicals.

Private contractors typically remove the state’s meth labs.

But some law enforcement agencies nationwide, including one in the Upstate, have sought to save money by doing much of the work themselves, a trend that accelerated last year when federal funds for cleanup evaporated.

The Drug Enforcement Administration is encouraging the approach by prioritizing funding in favor of states where officers clean up small labs themselves, put the waste in strategically placed containers and call contractors when the waste reaches a certain level.

A South Carolina group that included some of the state’s top law enforcement officers and emergency responders recommended against the approach, citing startup costs and liability.

WATERTOWN TWP. – An explosion damaged a mobile home in the Country Village Mobile Home Park shortly before 8 p.m. this evening.

“We heard a big boom, and went outside, and we could see smoke, and then three or four guys ran out of the trailer,” said Jessica Redman, who lives across the street.

She said the smoke smelled like “chemicals, a lot of chemicals.”

Clinton County Sheriff Wayne Kangas did not give exact details of what had caused the explosion, but he did say: “We’re sending our meth team down there.”

WALTERBORO, S.C. (WCIV)-- Walterboro police rounded up two people for shoplifting from a Walmart, but what they found in the suspect's car brought in Hazmat teams.

Around 5 p.m. on Jan 30th, Walterboro police were called to the Walmart on Bells Highway for a report of shoplifting. The Walmart loss prevention officer was struggling with 35-year-old Alvin Walling who was suspected of stealing a bag of candy.

Also in the store was 25-year-old Kelsie Ammons. Both people were suspected of shoplifting clothing in an earlier case. Ammons' purse was searched and wrappers from the stolen candy was found inside.

When police searched the suspect's car to see if any stolen merchandise was inside, they found what they thought was an open container of alcohol. It turned out to be a portable "meth cook" in the process of cooking and highly unstable.

DEA officers and Hazmat crews were notified and Ammons had to go through a decontamination process before being booked at the Colleton County Detention Center.

WARRICK CO., IN (WFIE) -
Five suspects have been arrested in what authorities are calling a two county drug ring.

Warrick County authorities arrested two people last night on meth related charges and Posey County Deputies say that lead them to three more suspects who investigators say were stealing anhydrous ammonia from the Posey County Co-Op.

Deputies say the two groups were working together and communicating through text messages.

That's how two arrests turned into five.

Indian officials have asked Aurobindo Pharma to provide details of the late November fire at a manufacturing plant that left two workers dead and one injured. The fire, which happened at an API plant in Andhra Pradesh, started after an explosion when the chemical trityl perchlorate was in use.

The request aligns with government concerns over pharma manufacturing safety, reports Pharmabiz. The report notes the rising incidence of fires at drugmaker facilities, which have caused about 6 deaths recently.

Officials say they are conducting regular safety checks. "In spite of our reminders, most of the pharma [companies] are violating the safety norms and resorting to deceiving tactics," a factories officer explains in the report. Manufacturers are hiring unqualified laborers who are unaware of the hazards, he adds.

Aurobindo had been cited for fire safety violations in April.

Separately, the state Pollution Control Board has charged 6 Hyderabad-area drugmakers with environmental violations concerning the disposal of spent solvents. A task force suspects the companies are selling the substances to construction companies, which use them to produce bitumen for road construction rather than safely disposing of it.

The board is threatening the shutdown of the following companies: Lakshmi Saraswathi Chemicals & Organics, Sri Harsha Organic, Apex Drugs & Intermediates, Shruti Laboratories, SKR Chemicals and Sujith Chemicals, according to the Times of India.

Of late with the rising incidents of fire accidents in pharmaceutical factories the safety concerns have become a serious matter of debate. There has been a succession of fire accidents happening in chemical factories in and around Hyderabad.

Last week if it was an explosion in a chemical factory which killed 4 people in Green Park at Polepalli Pharma Special Economic Zone (SEZ) at Jadcherla, two days later, the explosion of a chemical reactor had charred the bodies of two employees in a huge fire at a pharmaceutical company at Patancheru about 50 kms from Hyderabad.

The fire broke out at the chemical factory of Rantus Pharma in Pashamylaram industrial area of Patancheru in Medak district. The factory was completely gutted. Two employees working at the factory did not return home. Their families lodged a complaint with the police. Investigators found skeletal remains of the missing employees in the rubble. The dead have been identified as stores manager Ravindranath and worker Ram Singh.

Earlier it was believed that only six workers had been injured in the fire. According to police, the fire engulfed the factory after a reactor exploded due to an electrical short-circuits. The fire broke out and spread to neighbouring factories. Fire-fighting personnel battled for five hours to control the flames.

“It is high time that the pharmaceutical companies should take utmost care and precautions to avoid any kind of fire accidents. Otherwise it gives a wrong impression to the world and may compel investors to look out for other safer zones. Already the pharma industry is moving a bit slow due to agitations locally and economic slow down in the international markets,” said an industry analyst.

For worker and operator who are working in chemical factories near reactors or blast furnaces they should be mind full of accidents and always be alert and cautious. Because in most of the chemical factories and chemical reactors there are possibilities of explosions from uncontrolled chemical reactions due to overpressure or due to release of energy from exothermal reactions (a result of mechanical damage or corrosion).

The worker should also be cautious and take precautions against exposure to hazardous substances due to a sudden release of toxic materials from reactors due to the work-related accident or as a result of human error.

Exposure to high temperatures and heat-stress from chemical reactors and exposure to carcinogenic, mutagenic and teratogenic substances present in the reactor or released from the reactor during cleaning and maintenance work may also cause catastrophic damage to the working force in the chemical factories.

Exposure to substances that can harm the nervous system and exposure to suspended dust PM10 can give rise to respiratory diseases.

Six workers suffered severe burns in a major fire that occurred in a pharmaceutical factory in the Pashamylaram industrial area in Patancheru, Medak district, on Sunday.

The reactor of Rantus Pharma Pvt. Ltd., which manufactures Tramadol, an analgesic, burst, and fire engulfed the entire building and later spread to adjacent buildings housing chemical companies Chaitanya Chloride, Aurobindo Chemicals and Satya Dev Chemical.

The injured workers were identified as Husain Ali, Javed Ali, Bapar Singh, Ravindernath, Sujam and Sriram. They are being treated at Remedy Hospital in Kukatpally. The condition of one worker is said to be critical.

PORTERVILLE, Calif. (KFSN) -- A South Valley man is in jail for causing an explosion while police say he was trying to make drugs in his apartment. It happened in Porterville on Sunnyside Street near Henderson Avenue.

Repairmen spent most of Monday replacing windows in several units at Sunnyside Apartments in Porterville after a drug-making experiment caused an explosion.

Porterville Police say Seth Liberty, 27, was trying to make a concentrated form of marijuana using a butane bottle and a plastic container.

Sgt. Ronald Moore said, "We think that a flame or a spark came out of the butane and ignited and caused the explosion."

Nicholas Clinger claims he was in the apartment when the explosion happened. He says he, Liberty and some other friends were trying to speed up the process of making a highly intoxicating hash out of marijuana so they put the container in the freezer.

Clinger said, "All that platter has gas and stuff in it but we wanted it to freeze up so we could smoke it already so we put it in the freezer and then boom that's it done deal don't put your hash in the freezer."

The blast blew the door off the refrigerator and broke the windows to the apartment and an apartment next door.

A 22-year-old man suffered severe burns when a Sebastopol-area mobile home in which he was staying exploded and went up in flames Saturday, authorities said.

The explosion is under investigation as being related to drug production, perhaps the manufacture of hash oil, in which volatile chemical solvents are used to separate potent resins from marijuana plant parts, Sonoma County Sheriff's Sgt. Vance Eaton said.

If true, it would be the second such incident within a week. On Tuesday night, suspected hash oil manufacturing sparked an explosion at a house on Santa Rosa's Morgan Street, prompting one arrest.

THE IRISH DEFENCE Forces had to carry out a controlled explosion today after an unstable chemical was found at the offices of the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland (PSI) in Dublin this morning.
An Army Bomb Disposal Team was called to the offices of the PSI, which regulates pharmacy services in Ireland, on Shrewsbury Road after the unstable chemical Picric Acid was found this morning.

Police say they have found items consistent with a drug laboratory at the site of an explosion in Millendon last night.

A 48-year-old man was taken to hospital with serious burns after the blast, which happened on the Great Northern Highway about 9.30pm.

A Fire and Emergency Services Authority spokesman said firefighters were called to a chemical fire in a large shed caused by the explosion.

He said the blaze was extinguished before firefighters arrived but still caused about $20,000 damage.

The injured man suffered severe burns to his back and is in the intensive care unit in hospital this morning.

Police say they also found a hydroponic set-up and a stolen motorcycle at the property.

ST. LOUIS • Three police officers were sent to the hospital after encountering a substance at the Mansion House apartment building this afternoon that made them feel ill.
Police said the officers were executing a search warrant in one of the units in the building, at 300 North Fourth Street, when they opened a container and were hit with a strong smell, apparently from some sort of chemical substance. The search warrant was not drug-relate, authorities said.
They experienced headaches, breathing problems and sweating, but are expected to be OK, police said.
Police and the fire department's hazmat team are investigating and do not yet have any more information about what was inside the container.

Investigators are still searching for a cause after a massive chemical fire at Naeja Pharmaceuticals in southeast Edmonton Tuesday. The blaze caused $7 million in damage.

Naeja Pharmaceuticals President and CEO Chris Micetich told CTV News a fire broke out over the lunch hour Tuesday in a refrigerator used to store chemicals. He says staff heard what sounded like a champagne bottle popping in the fridge.

"They opened up the fridge and they noticed there was a solvent that had spilled a little bit and while they were trying to determine what happened there was a spark and a flame broke out within the refrigerator."

Edmonton Fire Rescue received a 911 call after staff failed to contain the chemical. Sixty-five staff members working at the lab escaped safely.

An air quality advisory in southeast Edmonton was ordered following the explosion and blaze, with officials asking nearby residents to stay indoors -- keeping their furnaces and air conditioners off due to potentially toxic smoke. 

A man was seriously injured in an explosion in Bellingham today while he was making hashish. Not meth. Not crack. Hash.
KIRO:

Firefighters said a man had suffered multiple flash burns on his body after there was an explosion inside his home. Bellingham firefighters from the hazmat team responded to check for hazards and determined the home was safe.
Bellingham police officers entered the home to assess the damage and found 6.5 pounds of marijuana, butane bottles, drug paraphernalia and hashish, officers said.

MOORPARK, Calif. (KABC) -- Detectives are investigating a possible drug lab at a Moorpark home after an explosion and fire inside the garage injured two people on Wednesday morning.

Neighbors reported hearing an explosion around 1:25 a.m. in the 4200 block of Cedarpine Lane.

Two men in their 30s were injured and transported to area hospitals for treatment. A woman and a young child were inside the home at the time, but were able to get out of the residence unharmed.

Fire officials said the blaze was mainly contained to the garage area of home. Detectives said it appears butane was being used in the garage to cook the stems of marijuana and something went wrong.

Ventura County Sheriff's Deputy Robert Berger said the culprits were likely performing what's called "honey-oil extraction," which is a process that extracts tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, from leftover portions of marijuana that's normally not smoked, like the stem of the leaf.

Two men injured in an explosion at Kaiwaka may have been making cannabis oil when volatile chemicals used to make the drug blew up, police say.

Fire and St John Ambulance services were called to a house at 9Marshall Rd, Kaiwaka, about 18km northwest of Wellsford, at 3.38pm last Thursday after reports of an explosion at the property.

When they arrived two men, aged 19 and 20, were found with serious burns and flown to Middlemore Hospital by the Northland Electricity rescue helicopter.

The men were understood to have burns to their faces, arms, torso and legs.

The father of two suffered severe burns when his alleged clandestine drug lab exploded in the backyard of his Kemps Creek property in Sydney's southwest last year.

The aluminium shed used to make pseudoephedrine - a precursor chemical used to make illicit drugs - burst into flames shortly after midnight on October 10, police claim.

Dagger, 31, and a 23-year-old man both suffered burns. The 23-year-old man later died from his injuries.

Dagger has spent months recovering in hospital. This week, he was well enough to be arrested and charged.

The New Orleans Fire Department on Thursday responded to a "level one" hazmat incident at a city-operated health clinic in Central City.
chemical2056.jpgTed Jackson, The Times-PicayuneA New Orleans EMS paramedic talk to a woman outside the the Edna Pillsbury Health Clinic in Central City. A spill of formocresol, a medication used in root canal procedures that can cause eye and skin irritation, forced the clinic's closure for the day.

The incident at the Edna Pillsbury Health Clinic, 2222 Simon Bolivar Avenue, was called in about noon, the New Orleans Fire Department said.

Health Commissioner Dr. Karen DeSalvo said about an ounce of formocresol, a nerve-deadening agent, leaked out. Three employees came in contact with the agent and were treated.

Officials on Thursday afternoon closed the clinic for the day to decontaminate it since the chemical can become airborn, DeSalvo said. It will reopen Monday, she said.

Police have charged a man with allowing drugs to be manufactured after a fatal explosion at a suspected P-lab south of Auckland.

Clint Gordon Curly, 25, died in a blast at the property on Mckinney Rd in Glenbrook just before 6pm on Thursday.

Police have revealed Mr Curly was manufacturing an "illicit drug" when a chemical process went wrong and caused the explosion.

Forensic tests will determine which drug Mr Curly was manufacturing, police said.

The son of WA Police Commissioner Karl O'Callaghan was one of five people injured in an explosion at a clandestine drug factory in Carlisle late yesterday.

Russell O'Callaghan, 29, was severely burnt during the blast.

EAST WINDSOR — A township cop and Capital Health emergency medical technician were sickened and hospitalized Monday morning after being exposed to hallucinogenic PCP, a potent drug known on the streets “animal tranquilizer,” “embalming fluid,” and “angel dust,” cops said.

The incident began about 10:30 a.m. when a township cop escorted a man out of the East Windsor Municipal Court after the man reported he felt ill from consuming a substance suspected to be a PCP-laced cigarette, cops said.

The cop located the drugs in the man’s possession, and then the cop started to experience lightheadedness, according to township police, who didn’t identify the cop or suspected PCP man by name.

Not long afterward, the unnamed Capital Health EMT experienced lightheadedness while treating the suspected PCP man in an ambulance parked in front of township police headquarters, cops said.

This was a very sophisticated lab," said Commissioner David Chong, adding that he'd never seen anything like it in White Plains.
Chemical bottles, hanging wires, hoses, lighting fixtures and water pans covered 11C, a one-bedroom unit that included an illegal partition. Glass jars and plastic bags filled with marijuana were found in kitchen cabinets and closets. Plants loaded with buds lined two rooms. Police said it appeared that no one lived there.
Chong said the setup was very dangerous.
"Anytime this can go up in flames," he said.