BELLA VISTA -- Air quality tests detected a higher than normal level of benzene at the site of an underground fire along Trafalgar Road, a state official told residents Saturday.
Residents gathered to hear from officials during a resident-organized town hall at the Metfield Clubhouse. About 100 people attended the meeting filling a room and had more residents standing outside doors on either end.
The underground fire is on a site where the Bella Vista Property Owners Association operated a stump dump. Fire Department personnel said the fire may be burning more than 50 or 60 feet underground.
Fire Chief Steve Sims said firefighters were initially dispatched to the area July 29, where they spotted smoke and what appeared to be the remains of a brush fire. The property is owned by Brown's Tree Care.
There were no controlled burns listed in the dispatch log, he said, and the property owner denies burning brush.
Fighting the fire is difficult, dangerous and expensive, he said, and the Fire Department has been focused on keeping it contained.
The department has also collaborated with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality since the fire started, he said.
A family filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the property owner, alleging the fire has caused illnesses, nuisances and diminished property value and seeking monetary damage as well as an end to the fire.
Stuart Spencer, associate director of the office of air quality at ADEQ, told the audience test results from air samples collected by the federal Environmental Protection Agency last month were released Friday.
Several air toxins were tested from multiple air quality monitoring stations and benzene was the only to test at higher than normal levels, he said. The levels also only tested high on site, he said.
Benzene is a colorless, flammable liquid with a sweet odor and it evaporates quickly when exposed to air, according to the American Cancer Society. The chemical is a natural part of crude oil and gasoline, as well as detergents, drugs and pesticides.
Spencer said the presence of benzene suggests there's trash in the former dump site and not just yard waste.
ADEQ and EPA are attempting to establish dedicated monitoring of the area's air quality, and Spencer said he hopes to have it underway in the next few weeks.
Tom Judson, the property owners association's chief operating officer, said the association operated the stump dump on leased land starting December 2003 until the end of 2016 when the dump was capped with soil.
Judson said nobody monitored the site the last few years it was open, but staff would remove trash when possible. He said sometimes people dumped and tried to hide it.
Mayor Peter Christie said the city is working closely with ADEQ but lacks the expertise and resources necessary to handle this fire alone.
"We basically have only one tool in our kit bag, and that's water," he said. "The problem is ... that particular piece of property is a watershed for Lake Ann."
Dousing the flames with water may put out the fire, he said, but it risks contaminating the lake with unknown substances from the former dump site.
There are possible solutions, such as digging out all the material or building a berm around the former dump before flooding it, but money for those endeavors is beyond the city's budget and the city would do well to take advice from federal and state agencies, he said.
"The solution is exactly what we're doing, and that is to work with the ADEQ and the EPA," Christie said.
NW News on 12/02/2018