Southern California officials lifted a sweeping evacuation order in Orange County late Tuesday after firefighters announced they had stabilized a damaged chemical tank that had posed a risk of a potentially catastrophic explosion or spill.
Over the Memorial Day weekend, fears about the compromised tank, at an aerospace facility in Garden Grove, Calif., forced nearly 50,000 residents from their homes and prompted state and federal declarations of emergency.
More than 30,000 people were allowed to return on Monday night, after firefighters managed to cool down the tank’s toxic contents. However, the remaining 16,000 or so residents, who lived closer to the tank, had been told to stay away until firefighters could be sure that the chemicals were truly stable. That determination came Tuesday evening.
“We did it,” Craig Covey, an incident commander with the Orange County Fire Authority, announced, interrupting a crowded community meeting in Garden Grove where residents were demanding accountability for the crisis. The response was a confused, relieved and angry welter of boos and cheers.
Residents had to evacuate late last week after firefighters determined that a pressurized container containing a toxic substance had overheated and was poised to burst at GKN Aerospace’s manufacturing plant in Orange County. GKN, which is based in Britain, produces components for military and civilian aircraft.
The crisis, which officials had feared would end either in a toxic blast or a devastating hazardous waste spill, drew worldwide attention.
Emergency responders and scientific experts raced to cool down the bulging tank and safeguard surrounding communities. They doused the tank for days with water sprayed from fire hoses and opened more than half a dozen evacuation sites in a matter of hours on a holiday weekend.
By Monday, firefighters reported that the tank’s temperature had started to drop and that it was safe for most of the evacuees to begin returning.
On Tuesday, Greg Barta, an Orange County Fire Authority spokesman, reported that the temperature inside the tank, previously in the triple digits, had dropped to about 92 degrees and was holding steady. As the day progressed, fire officials said, they ceased dousing the tanks.
On Tuesday evening, after a four-hour period during which the tanks remained stable even without the cooling measures, fire officials lifted the evacuation order for all residents, some of whom had been sleeping in cars or tents since Friday. Officials reduced the restricted area to a 300-foot perimeter around the equipment.
Apologizing for interrupting the meeting, Mr. Covey told residents, “I didn’t want to delay your getting home.”
The incident has prompted members of the communities around the plant to demand accountability from GKN and the local authorities.
“The imminent threat has been taken out of the equation, but this raises serious questions about the extent to which the government allowed this facility to expand,” said Carlos Perea, executive director of the Harbor Institute for Immigrant & Economic Justice, one of several local organizations that called for the relocation of GKN Aerospace from Garden Grove, where it has operated for decades.
“This was a military manufacturing facility with dangerous equipment operating literally in the middle of working-class neighborhoods.”
In a statement, GKN, whose executives did not appear at the Tuesday afternoon meeting, pointed out that “there have been no leaks or contamination” and that the company was continuing to work with the state and local authorities. GKN’s statement added, “We apologize for the ongoing disruption this incident is causing, and our priority remains the safety of our neighbors and our community.”
In a letter to GKN, Representative Derek T. Tran, the area’s congressman, called on company executives in Britain to meet with his constituents in Orange County.
“Lives have been upended and livelihoods disrupted,” he wrote. “A community cannot thrive while living in fear of potential hazards in its own backyard.”
At two community meetings on Tuesday — one convened by the congressman, the other by Garden Grove city officials — residents asked how they should comfort their frightened children and get reimbursed for lost business, whether they needed to proactively wear protective masks and whether the crisis would affect their insurance coverage.
Mr. Covey’s announcement, at the Garden Grove meeting, came as local activists called for GKN’s closure and weary residents asked how officials in the working-class community planned to prevent future industrial accidents.
Separately, at least one lawsuit was filed over the weekend by residents who claimed that the aerospace company had negligently stored and released the chemical in the tank, methyl methacrylate. Even short-term exposure to the chemical, which is used to make resins and acrylic plastics, can cause skin and eye irritation and respiratory issues.
Local and state officials have pledged to investigate the episode as well as complaints that hotels were illegally overcharging evacuees.
Even the upcoming California primary election was complicated by the crisis.
“I left my ballot on my desk,” Minh Hoang, 24, an evacuee who lives just around the corner from the chemical plant, said as he waited for help earlier Tuesday at a pop-up voting tent near the Orange County Registrar of Voters. The impromptu site assisted evacuees in English, Spanish and Vietnamese, and its staff was able to issue and receive ballots during the last week of voting, which ends June 2.
