Spanish authorities told almost 80,000 residents near the southern city of Seville to stay indoors on Wednesday after a fire at a chemical products warehouse spread a giant plume of smoke.
Emergency services said they received reports in the early afternoon of black smoke billowing from an industrial estate in Alcalá de Guadaira, a town of around 77,000 people southeast of Seville.
They evacuated the estate and asked the town’s population to “close doors and windows to prevent the smoke entering… and stay at home”.
Advertisement
The fire started in a chemical warehouse, “apparently” due to “a spark” in a tank containing a “quite toxic” product, Alcalá de Guadaira mayor Ana Isabel Jimenez Contreras told reporters.
“We have been told that this danger no longer exists, because the tank has completely burned and, therefore, the material no longer exists,” she added, explaining the blaze was “controlled and contained”.
Two people were lightly injured and treated at the scene — a worker who suffered burns and someone who inhaled smoke, the mayor said.
The fire comes after more than 160,000 people near Barcelona were told to stay indoors for nearly seven hours on Saturday after a fire at an industrial warehouse released a toxic cloud of chlorine over a wide area.
