Carbon monoxide leak sends Cooke Aquaculture staff to hospital - CBC

Cooke Aquaculture's office building at 76 Carleton St. in Saint John was evacuated Friday afternoon following a carbon monoxide leak. (Roger Cosman/CBC)Social SharingA carbon monoxide leak forced the evacuation of Cooke Aquaculture's office building in uptown Saint John on Friday afternoon, sending several employees to hospital.

Company spokesperson Joel Richardson said employees on the building's third floor began feeling ill around mid-afternoon. The company evacuated the building and called 911.

Firefighters and Liberty Gas crews found a pipe had come loose from the furnace at the company's building at the intersection of Carleton Street and Wellington Row, allowing carbon monoxide to leak inside.

"It appears that the pipe may have just vibrated loose from the furnace," Richardson said.

He described it as a friction-fit pipe and said the cause is still under investigation by the gas company and the company's maintenance crews.

About 75 to 80 people work in the building. Richardson said roughly a third of them, those on the third floor, were feeling ill. About 22 required treatment from paramedics. Several were taken to hospital as a precaution, and the remaining employees were sent home late Friday afternoon.

Richardson said the group was taken to hospital by city bus, which he described as standard emergency response protocol when many people are affected at once.

Saint John Regional Hospital declared a Code Orange shortly after 4 p.m. to prepare for the influx of patients. The emergency response protocol was lifted at 8:30 p.m.

Richardson said everyone had returned home by Saturday morning and appears to be recovering well. The company will continue monitoring employees in the coming days.

"It's very unfortunate. I mean, you never want these things to happen, but when they do, you certainly have to take them seriously and be very prepared," Richardson said.

He said the timing helped. The company had held a fire drill just days earlier.

Crews ventilated the building Friday evening, clearing the gas. The office, in a building Cooke has occupied since 2019, is set to reopen Monday.

Polina Kozlova is a journalist based in Fredericton. You can contact her with story ideas at polina.kozlova@cbc.ca .