MELVINDALE, Michigan, October 17, 2007 (ENS) - A 500 gallon hydrochloric acid leak occurred Tuesday morning at Reilly Plating Co. in Melvindale. The company's 100,000 square foot facility is about 10 miles southwest of downtown Detroit.

Due to rain in the area, the hydrochloric acid and water mix created a small acid cloud at 8 am local time.

Local responders ordered the evacuation of about 20 residents living in a nearby trailer park.

At 11:25 local time, the evacuation was increased to one-quarter mile, including about 3,000 residents, three schools, a high-rise apartment building, and other commercial/industrial facilities. Residents of a local senior citizen center were ordered to shelter in place.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, sent on scene coordinators to the site. The Michigan State Emergency Management Operations Center was contacted by the FEMA Region V Duty Officer. The center was not activated, but it was monitoring the situation.

At 3:00 pm local time the EPA reported that the spill had been contained, monitoring of the air quality within the evacuation zone was conducted and was found to be within acceptable levels.

Five hours later, at approximately 8:30 pm the cleanup of the hydrochloric acid leak was completed and the evacuation order was lifted. No state or federal assistance was requested.

The company said today that the hydrochloric acid was contained in a retention basin designed to hold such spills and no harmful fumes were emitted during the incident.

One of the largest metal plating services in the country, Reilly Plating has been providing metal finishing services to the automotive and general industries for over 50 years, specializing in barrel zinc and zinc/alloy electroplating, mechanical plating, phosphating, and painting.

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