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Some Braved Ammonia Leak

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By GRETCHEN PARKER, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 15, 2007

RIVERVIEW - Steve Leske rushed chicken-rib combos out the door in to-go boxes as a thick white cloud settled over the Alafia River and the noxious smell of ammonia seeped into his restaurant.

Peck's Chicken, he told his workers and customers Monday night, was closed. He locked the doors just as the dinner rush would have started, and he threw out $1,000 worth of chicken by the time the evacuation orders in this corner of Riverview were lifted just before 1 p.m. Wednesday. By then, air quality tests showed the area was clear of ammonia.

As careful as Leske was, many of his neighbors threw caution to the wind - and straight into that silent, ominous plume of gas.

They stayed put.

"I just cannot abandon it. I've got too much stuff in here," said Dan Pickard of Dan's Bar, looking around his establishment as he signed an invoice for the beer man.

So when firefighters and sheriff's deputies told him to evacuate, he closed the front doors and let a dozen of his regulars stay. They sat on their usual stools and drank quietly, while authorities worked to evacuate everyone within a half-mile radius of where a 16-year-old had drilled a hole into the ammonia pipeline.

"We just kicked back and rode it out," Pickard said. He's proud that this "old Cracker beer joint" on U.S. 301 has stayed mostly in his family since 1933 and has never been closed a full day.

The leak and the cloud were about a football field away. "You could smell it," Pickard said, "but it wasn't real bad."

Behind the bar is a neighborhood of mobile homes that Pickard also owns. Many residents there also stayed behind, even after deputies walked through and pounded on their doors with flashlights.

Petty crime in the area is a concern, Pickard said. Everyone in the trailer park knows that when the sun goes down, property left unattended is property gone missing, he said.

They stuck it out to protect their homes from looters, he said.

Others near the cloud said they never got a call from reverse 911 and then were told by sheriff's deputies that it was OK to stay.

"We pretty much monitored it ourselves. We didn't feel like we were in any danger," said Woody Futch, whose mobile home sits on the bank of the river and is within throwing distance of where the cloud settled.

He and others who live on this sandy path, in neat mobile homes surrounded by potted plants and patio chairs, puzzled over why they weren't told to leave. They walked over to where sheriff's deputies patrolled near the leak, and were told that the wind was blowing away from them.

"They said if the wind changed, they would let us know," said Woody's wife, Cora Futch.

They waited.

On Tuesday, the cloud lingered. The Futches watched as sea gulls swarmed over the suffocating catfish that flopped on the surface of the river. For the first time, they smelled ammonia.

They decided to leave for a couple of hours to give the cloud time to dissipate. They went to Cora's sister's, a block and a half away.

Alicia Griffin lives on the other side of the river, about a quarter-mile from the leak. She and her neighbors also weren't notified of any evacuation, she said. They knew from watching television news that there was an ammonia cloud nearby and debated over whether to pack up her 5- and 9-year-olds.

She walked three houses down to the riverbank to take a look. She saw the eerie-looking cloud hanging over the water.

"I said, 'Yeah. We're going to go. That does not look good.'"

She and her children and their cat and three dogs stayed overnight with a friend in Lithia, but she returned home Tuesday - before evacuation orders were lifted.

Her neighbor, Heather Grebe, wondered whether she should evacuate with her mother, who is a heart patient. She worried when her mom woke up Tuesday morning with a burning throat.

Grebe asked a 911 dispatcher if it was OK to be outside, and the dispatcher told her to hold her nose if she had to go outdoors, she said.

She also stuck it out, deciding to stay behind.

"We recommended people evacuate. Some did; some didn't," said Willie Puz, a Hillsborough County spokesman. "And some came back early."

Those who did evacuate might be able to recover some of their expenses; Tampa Pipeline officials said Wednesday that residents could bring original receipts for meals and hotel rooms to the office at 5802 Hartford St. They should also bring in proof of where they live, office manager Nancy Taylor said.

The office is open from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. For now, the company isn't reimbursing businesses that lost money, but it may later, Taylor said.

Reporter Gretchen Parker can be reached at (813)259-7562 or gparker@tampatrib.com.

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