By
The Associated Press
BONITA, La. - Authorities evacuated this rural farming town of about 265 people after a noxious cloud drifted in from a cotton gin with a leaking fertilizer tank.
State police said the cloud leaked from a 30,000-gallon tank of anhydrous ammonia, which is used as a fertilizer. Troopers in hazardous-materials suits reached the tank early yesterday and shut off an open valve to stop the leak.
Evacuated residents were to be allowed to return home as soon as environmental officials determined it was safe, probably sometime yesterday, a state trooper said.
After the leak was discovered at about 9:30 p.m. Saturday, authorities spent three hours going door-to-door to get residents to leave Bonita, in northeast Louisiana near the Arkansas state line.
James Clark said he got a telephone call telling him to evacuate as his family was preparing for bed.
"I grabbed my four kids. My wife and I ran and got in the car and kicked off," Clark said yesterday. Clark, who lives a short distance from the source of the leak, said he could smell the ammonia as he headed for the car.
About four people who inhaled fumes were taken to a command post and given oxygen, said state police spokesman Cam Douglas. He was unaware of health problems.
About 80 people went to a shelter set up in Bastrop, about 20 miles southeast of Bonita.
Douglas said the open valve on the tank "makes us suspicious somebody might have tried to steal some and left it open.'"
He said anhydrous ammonia can also be used to make the drug methamphetamine.
