South Auckland Residents Wake up to Toxic Smoke

Plumes of black smoke rises over Papakura as a fire takes hold in a scrap metal yard in Auckland, New Zealand, on Jan. 13, 2021. Phil Walter/Getty Images

A scrapyard blaze in south Auckland briefly brought the city’s train network to a standstill as residents received health warnings over the toxic smoke covering the region.

Fire and Emergency New Zealand (FENZ) were alerted to smoke in south Auckland at midnight on May 31. On arrival, they found a pile of scrap metal that was 70 metres long and wide and 10 metres high on fire.

FENZ issued warnings that the fire could be releasing toxic smoke and warned nearby residents to keep windows and doors shut and turn off any air conditioning that draws from the air outside.

The toxicity was not the result of burning chemicals but rather the mix of plastics within the scrap metal pile.

As a result, Auckland Transport suspended all train services for two hours due to the fire, which was located near its train control centre, which was evacuated.

While the centre remained evacuated for the remainder of the day, limited train services resumed under the watch of KiwiRail’s Wellington train control service.

One resident who lives within one kilometre of the scrapyard fire said he had a haze around his house and a strong smell of burnt plastic.

“We’ve kept all doors & windows closed all morning. There’s a haze round the outside of the house, & in our living room there’s a strong smell of burned plastic (which probably speaks to our windows as much as the fire),” resident Max Harris shared on Twitter.

Another resident who lives around eight kilometres further away told local media that the smell was strong even at her house.

Jo Robertson said that she and her husband woke up at around 2:30 a.m. to the smell of burning rubber.

“It woke us up,” she told the New Zealand Herald.

“We went to all the rooms around the house, and outside we couldn’t find anything on fire. But the smell was very strong. I had to turn the air filter off.”

Threat Over

Guy Coulson, a principal scientist of air quality at New Zealand’s National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, noted that exposure to any type of smoke was generally harmful.

“There are two main ways smoke causes harm. Particles, any composition, irritate and inflame the lungs causing respiratory symptoms. They also enter the bloodstream and cause cardiovascular problems—all the way up to heart attacks and strokes,” he said.

“Burning plastics can release any number of carcinogens, the results of exposure to these may not become apparent for years, and other compounds that are more immediately harmful. Without knowing what materials there are, it’s impossible to say much more than general comments.

“Anyone immediately downwind is at risk, particularly those with respiratory or cardiovascular conditions. How much at risk depends on lots of things but chiefly how windy it is and how close they are.”

David Burrows, the chief operating officer of Sims Metal, where the fire occurred, said he was “deeply sorry” for the inconvenience that the fire had caused.

“At approximately 12:00 a.m. on Wednesday, 31 May, we experienced a fire in a pile of post-consumer material that was waiting to be processed at our facility in Favona,” he said.

“While FENZ and our local team are making progress in this regard, due to the size of the pile, we expect that it will take some time to fully extinguish the fire.”

Sims Metal is a metal recycling company founded in Australia that processes around 10 million tonnes of metal worldwide.

FENZ later issued an update that the toxic threat had passed.

Firefighters expect to extinguish and overhaul the remainder of the scrap metal pile overnight.