French Chemical Leak Wafting Into UK

A leaky chemical plant in France is stinking up southern England. Julie Noce reports.

Published

4 months ago

Categories

Seriously?, World

Topics

Seriously?, Europe

People

Martin Adams

Places

France, United Kingdom

Transcript

Something stinks in southern England. And it's coming from France. (SOUNDBITE (English) UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN SAYING: "It just smelled like dirt to me, dirty, greasy smell, sort of sweaty." (SOUNDBITE (English) UNIDENTIFIED MEN SAYING: "Smelly trainers, yeah, it could be, yeah." SOUNDBITE (English) UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN SAYING: ".. my housemate thought it smelled like fish, it just didn't smell very nice, it was really like, mwah." The culprit... a chemical factory in France that sprung a leak sending a noxious, but harmless, cloud of gas into southern England. At first residents didn't know what it was. SOUNDBITE (English) KENT FIRE AND RESCUE AREA MANAGER, MARTIN ADAMS, SAYING: " It is actually a substance called mercaptan which is a stenching agent that is put into gas, normal domestic gas supplies that you receive in your home, to indicate that there may be a gas leak of some kind, so you can actually smell the gas." The French plant makes industrial lubricants and paint and said work is underway to contain the fumes , although the process could take hours or even days to complete.