River Cree Resort and Casino evacuated due to ammonia leak

More than a thousand people had to be evacuated from the River Cree Resort and Casino, as well as the adjacent rink Saturday morning after a 911 call came in around 10:30 a.m. about an ammonia leak at the arena, says Edmonton Fire spokesperson Tim Wilson.

“The people I was working with starting smelling it and they started to get headaches and they just started moving out,” said one man who was part of the Hunt Fest tradeshow happening at the Twin Rinks arena.

Wilson says that the rink was immediately evacuated, as was the attached resort and casino as a precaution.

“I want to compliment the staff at both the casino and Twin Arenas for evacuating people and making sure this is carried out in a safe fashion,” said John Lamb, Deputy Fire Chief of Operations for the City of Edmonton Fire Department.

As Hazmat crews tried to pinpoint where and how the leak started, another crew monitored air quality.

“Ammonia typically at approximately 25 ppm is an extreme irritant to the eyes and nose (as well as throat and lungs)…and we had some measurements a little higher than that and we haven’t determined how high they are exactly at this point.

Lamb said at one location, a reading measured the ammonia level at approximately 300 ppm.

Prolonged or extreme exposure can result in blindness, lung damage, seizures and death, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

Since typically ammonia is used for refrigeration, and as this happened at a hockey rink, he expects that what it was being used for.

The public was asked to avoid the area as crews continued a planned ventilation of the building. But Global News has been told the Hunt Fest is now back on, and will be running until 7 p.m. on Saturday.

With files from the Edmonton Journal