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by SAM DOLNICK
More than 100 rescue workers, dozens of them wearing protective body suits, responded to a minor blaze at a Rosebank chemical plant yesterday morning after a nontoxic substance used to make dye caught fire.
Between 50 and 60 workers from Sun Chemical Corp., an organic pigment plant, were evacuated from the Tompkins Avenue factory around 9 a.m. None of the employees were injured and fire officials said the blaze posed no threat to the neighborhood.
The Sun Chemical staff was back at work by 11:30 a.m., according to a company spokesman.
Sun Chemical officials are investigating the cause of the fire, which occurred in a drying unit where water is dried out from organic pigments used to color everything from lipstick to automotive paint.
After extinguishing the fire, which was contained to the drying unit, 25 firefighters showered at the site and were decontaminated. They left the plant dressed in clean plastic suits, with their contaminated uniforms inside durable plastic bags.
No one was seriously hurt, but nine firefighters were taken to Staten Island University Hospital, Ocean Breeze, for minor irritant respiratory injuries, according to Fire Department spokesman Kevin Nolan.
Ed Faulkner, communications director for Performance Pigments Group, a subsidiary of Sun Chemical, said plant managers responded to the fire according to protocol.
"We always evacuate the plant as a precaution in a situation like this," Faulkner said.
The Fire Department Hazardous Materials Unit responded to the scene, along with more than 10 other trucks, including a Decontamination Unit and a Mask Service Unit.
Despite the heavy response, fire officials said the blaze was mild.
"It wasn't a major fire," Chief John Bambury of Division 8 said at the scene. "There would have been two engines responding if it wasn't in a chemical factory. There's no real danger here."
Nevertheless, the commotion made some neighbors uneasy.
"I've lived here 40 years and I'm always nervous," said Linda Gregory, who lives across from the plant.
Pointing to rescue workers parading by in plastic suits, she asked, "If it's nothing, why would they make them suit up?"
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