By Anthony Sommer, Star-Bulletin
Kauai Police Chief George Freitas notifies Gay Balmores
that her daughter was one of the students taken to the
hospital after a noxious gas forced the evacuation of more
than 800 students from King Kaumualii Elementary
School in Hanamaulu.

Noxious fumes
send 40 kids
to Kauai hospital

The type and source of
the chemical aren't known

By Anthony Sommer
Kauai Correspondent

HANAMAULU, Kauai -- Mystified and frustrated hazardous materials experts from Kauai Fire Department continued to search this afternoon for the source of a irritating chemical gas that forced the evacuation of more than 800 students from King Kaumualii Elementary School this morning.

At least one student was admitted for observation. A hospital spokeswoman said residents of the area continued to arrive at the emergency room seeking treatment this afternoon.

Forty children and two adults were treated at Wilcox Memorial Hospital for burning eyes, breathing difficulty and nausea. Doctors were frustrated at not knowing exactly what caused the irritation, said the spokeswoman.

After the evacuation, firefighters went back into the school at a teacher's request to rescue a cockatiel and a rabbit, both pets in a classroom.

The rest of the children were taken by school bus to Kauai War Memorial Convention Center where hundreds of parents waited to pick them up.

Tim Bynum, who was waiting to pick up his daughter, Kelly, a 4th grader, said he was relieved when he heard on his car radio that none of the children were seriously ill. "I was on my way to the school and I saw an ambulance coming," he said. "That shook me."

Many were told their children were at the hospital and sent there.

Kelsey Sumida, a 5th grader at King Kaumualii Elementary, was still wearing a hospital bracelet and a green sticker attached to his shirt at the hospital when he went home with his father, Joel.

"We were in reading class and they told us to go back to the classroom and there was this smell so we went out in single file to the playground," Kelsey said. "There were paramedics there and some people were having a hard time breathing."

Kuhio Highway, the major artery from Hanamaulu through Kapaia to Lihue was closed for about an hour early this afternoon. Twenty-nine children from Lihue Hongwanji Preschool in Kapaia were evacuated as a precaution.

The Fire Department said it had ruled out chemical spraying from nearby Lihue Plantation and by the State Highway Department. As of mid-afternoon they were checking sewer pumps and a fertilizer batch plant in the area.