Monoxide

Authorities say six people have been sickened by carbon monoxide aboard a cruise ship docked in Baltimore. Baltimore fire department spokesman Chief Kevin Cartwright says crews are on the scene to treat the victims. A hazmat team is trying to determine where the leak is coming from. Cartwright didn't know how ill the victims are or whether they were crew members or passengers. It's also unclear how many people were on the ship. The incident occurred aboard the Celebrity Mercury cruise ship.

Students and staff were evacuated from Westside Elementary School in Baltimore's Penn North neighborhood early Friday morning after carbon monoxide levels rose to a level higher than is considered safe in the school's boiler room, a Baltimore City Public Schools spokeswoman said. Everyone exited the building in the 2200 block of N. Fulton Ave., south of Druid Hill Park in West Baltimore, sometime after the morning bell rang so work crews could assess where the gas was coming from, said Edie House Foster, the spokeswoman.

IT'S A GRIM but regular event of the winter heating season: families endangered, people made ill and even, sometimes, lives lost. It's the result of excess carbon monoxide, which can build up in closed-up houses where the heat comes from a furnace or stove that burns fossil fuel.Carbon monoxide is a colorless, odorless, tasteless byproduct of burning wood, gas, oil or coal. Normally, it is dispersed by vents through chimneys. However, when the vents get blocked, the gas can back up. It's heavier than air, so it will pool in low places first.

Among the 54 calls for medical and fire-rescue service received by the Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department during the period Nov. 25 to Dec. 2 were the following: Vero Road, 3900 block, 9:43 a.m. Nov. 30. Crews from the Violetville, Arbutus, English Consul, Lansdowne and Owings Mills volunteer stations and Catonsville, Halethorpe, Randallstown, and Westview career stations responded to the report of a United Parcel Service building fire in...

Four members of a Northwest Baltimore family, including two children, were hospitalized yesterday after becoming ill from carbon monoxide fumes emanating from their home's basement furnace, said a spokesman for the city Fire Department. Chief Kevin Cartwright said firefighters received a 911 call about 4:20 p.m. from a sickened family member at a home in the 3800 block of Boarman Ave. A woman, her 16-year-old daughter, a toddler and the children's grandmother were removed from the house and given oxygen at the scene by medics, Cartwright said.

Four people, including a baby, were taken from a Baltimore County apartment complex to hospitals Friday afternoon with carbon monoxide poisoning. When firefighters arrived at the Eagles Crest Complex in Fullerton, they found a 20-year-old woman holding an 11-month-old unconscious girl, said Fire Department spokeswoman Elise Armacost. They had made it out of their unit at 7508 Twincrest Court, but crews had to rescue a 44-year-old woman who was unconscious in the apartment, she said.

Seventeen churchgoers were taken to a hospital yesterday for suspected carbon-monoxide poisoning, according to Calvert County firefighters. A child suffered a seizure at Waters Memorial United Methodist Church in the 5400 block of Mackall Road in Mutual about 9:40 a.m., according to firefighters. Shortly afterward, others began complaining of nausea and headaches. Twelve adults and five children were taken to Calvert Memorial Hospital for testing. All are expected to recover, according to a hospital spokeswoman.

Six people, including a toddler, were taken to area hospitals yesterday morning after firefighters removed them from a house in North Baltimore that was filled with carbon monoxide gas leaking from a malfunctioning water heater and furnace. Firefighters were called to the house in the 2000 block of Ramblewood Road in the city's Ramblewood neighborhood about 9:30 a.m., said department spokesman Chief Kevin Cartwright. Someone inside the house used a cell phone to call 911, he said. The victims, who ranged in age from 33 years to 17 months, were expected to survive, even though they had high levels of carbon monoxide in their blood systems at the time of their rescue, Cartwright said.

In what they called "an abundance of caution," the owners of a Northeast Baltimore apartment building in which nine people were sickened by a carbon monoxide leak said Monday that they would replace water heaters in four of the complex's 803 units. Sawyer Realty Holdings LLC issued a statement saying the Sunday leak at the Dutch Village Townhomes appeared to have come from a faulty water heater in a vacant unit. The carbon-monoxide detector in that unit went off and alerted tenants in a neighboring apartment.

Robin Lambo was asleep when the firefighters pounded on her door about 7:30 a.m. yesterday. Still in her nightclothes, she managed to ask whether she could pull on a pair of shorts before being led from her apartment on the 11th floor of the Virginia Towers in Towson. But the 39-year-old disabled woman didn't have time in those frantic moments to grab her purse and medicine - a common problem during yesterday's evacuation of about 150 disabled and senior residents from the 15-story high-rise at 500 Virginia Ave. after carbon monoxide was detected.

Occupants of a Joppatowne home were taken to an area hospital Tuesday night after a carbon monoxide detector activated in the home, where Harford County fire officials say a generator may have been improperly used. "Three persons were taken to an area hospital after the fire dept. responded to a residence in Joppatowne for a carbon monoxide detector activation," Rich Gardiner, spokesman for the Harford Fire and EMS Association, posted on the association's Facebook media page shortly before 4 a.m. Wednesday.

A carbon monoxide incident closed an annex at Baltimore City's Main Post Office Monday and sent two people to University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center. Fire crews responded at about 8:30 a.m. to the one-story annex at Colvin and Lexington streets, near the main building in the 900 block of East Fayette Street. They found one person who had suffered a head injury from a fall and several other employees complaining of dizziness. A hazmat unit conducted air monitoring and determined that there were 38 parts per million of carbon monoxide inside the 35,000-square-foot building.

Among the 68 calls the Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department received for medical and fire-rescue service Jan. 8-15 were the following: Gateway Terrace, 4700 block, 8:33 p.m. Jan. 13. Crews from the Arbutus volunteer station and Halethorpe career station responded to the report of a carbon monoxide alarm in Arbutus. A low level of carbon monoxide was discovered, and the scene was secured for BG&E. Frederick Road, 6300 block, 3:27 p.m. Jan. 13. Crews responded to the report of an person with health problems in Catonsville and transported one critically ill person to a local hospital.

Two city residents were taken to an area hospital after a carbon monoxide leak in a Lake Clifton home Thursday morning, officials said. City fire and hazardous materials crews responded at 10:02 a.m. to a home in the 1900 block of N. Washington St. after a report of a carbon monoxide leak. Two residents were taken to an area hospital with injuries that were serious but not life threatening, officials said. Two others were treated at the scene. Investigators are working to determine the source of the leak, which was discovered in the basement of the rowhouse.

Among the 70 calls for medical and fire-rescue service the Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department received Oct. 30 Nov. 6 were the following: Beechfield Avenue at Wilkens Avenue, 2:28 p.m. Nov. 4. Crews from the Arbutus and Lansdowne volunteer stations responded to the report of a motor vehicle accident with injury in Arbutus. One person with non-life-threatening injuries taken to a local hospital. Birch Avenue, 1300 block, 5:09 p.m. Nov. 2. Crews from the Arbutus, Lansdowne and Violetville volunteer stations and Halethorpe career station responded to the report of a dwelling fire in Arbutus and found a clogged dryer vent, but no fire.

An elderly couple was found dead Saturday night in their Carroll County home that emergency personnel discovered to contain 80 times the normal level of carbon monoxide. Lewis Keyser, 81 and his 84-year-old wife, Betty, were found in the basement of the house. Relatives told Maryland State police that they found the house in the 1900 block of Lang Road in Hampstead filled with soot and haze Police said Sunday that no foul play is suspected and that the couple was last seen on Thursday.

The Annapolis Police Department headquarters was evacuated Wednesday and two of its employees remained sick Thursday after a potentially deadly gas was drawn into the building, which is under renovation. Carbon monoxide sickened many people in the building, including the receptionist, who appeared to have been rendered unconscious by the gas, said Maj. Scott Baker of the Annapolis police. Two people, both of whom work near air vents, were treated at Anne Arundel Medical Center and released, but had not returned to work Thursday, Baker said.

Twenty-two people were hospitalized last night with carbon monoxide poisoning, and the eastern Baltimore County apartment complex where they live was evacuated, a county Fire Department spokesman said.Firefighters were called to Ross Ridge Apartments in the first block of Parham Circle in Rossville about 5 p.m. after members of a family in a ground-floor apartment, who had been feeling ill for several days, bought a carbon monoxide detector that went off as soon as it was installed, said Battalion Chief Mark Hubbard, the spokesman.

A Howard County motel was temporarily evacuated Saturday night after rescue personnel discovered high levels of potentially lethal carbon monoxide there, a county fire and rescue spokesman said. Responders were called to the Sleep Inn on Second Street in North Laurel about 8:32 p.m. to check a report of a possible chemical leak, and found five children complaining of headaches and nausea, according to Battalion Chief Eric D. Proctor. Monitoring equipment detected high levels of poisonous carbon monoxide gas in the air, prompting authorities to evacuate 30 motel occupants and take 11 of them to hospitals in Laurel and Columbia.