Monday, February 08, 1999
Pepper spray is blamed for fumes
BY MIRIAM SMITH
The Cincinnati Enquirer
TRENTON — A pizza box placed on top of a pepper spray canister was blamed for setting off stinging vapors that forced a family to flee their Sycamore Street apartment.
All residents living in the eight-unit Sycamore Apartments building were evacuated about 9:30 p.m. Saturday while area fire officials investigated.
Six people — three adults and three children — were treated for throat irritation at the Middletown Regional Hospital before being released, said Trenton Fire Chief Jim Mulligan.
Hazardous-materials (Hazmat) teams from Middletown and Hamilton were called in after fire officials interviewed the Richard Bunger family and couldn't find the source of the vapors, Chief Mulligan said. Madison Township firefighters also assisted.
Hazmat teams searched the apartment twice before finding the hand-held pepper spray device, which Mr. Bunger recently bought for his wife, he said.
The safety on the device was apparently left open and was set off when someone in the family put a pizza box on it before it fell behind a stereo.
“All of a sudden it just hit the whole family,” Chief Mulligan said. “I guess it didn't come across their minds about that (pepper spray) container at all. Then we found the container and they said, "Oh yeah.' That would have saved us a lot of trouble.”
Residents were allowed back in the building about 1:30 a.m. Sunday after the apartments had been ventilated, Chief Mulligan said.
Mr. Bunger, 30, his wife, Martha, 23, and their 2-year-old daughter were taken to the hospital. Mr. Bunger's sister, Wilma Hamons, 34, and her two children, ages 8 and 9, also were treated at the hospital, Chief Mulligan said.
Fire officials declared the area a “hot zone” and were wearing protective suits until they figured out what was causing the fumes.
“It just had us puzzled there,” said Chief Mulligan.
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