DIXFIELD — The Maine Department of Transportation facility on Main Street was evacuated Friday morning after a possible carbon monoxide leak was reported.
Dixfield fire Chief Scott Dennett said Friday evening that Med-Care and the Dixfield Fire Department responded to a report of people feeling ill at the MDOT garage.
“After we realized there were a lot of people feeling sick, we evacuated the building,” Dennett said. “Once everyone was out, we did an air analysis test to see if there were high levels of carbon monoxide. There was one office in particular that had something of an odor in it, but the air quality levels were normal.”
Dennett said that upon investigation, the fire department and Med-Care were unable to find out what caused the employees’ illnesses.
“I mean, we did air monitoring, used thermal-imaging cameras and searched the whole buildings, and we weren’t able to find anything that could’ve caused an illness,” Dennett said. “Before we left, we told the employees to open the windows and air out the rooms, just in case. As of today, we’re not sure what exactly caused the illness.”
One possible cause of the illnesses, Dennett said, is that a battery or machine in the garage was leaking some sort of gas.
“This is just a wild guess, though,” Dennett said. “There’s no evidence to support that right now.”
Dennett said that one employee took themselves to Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston for evaluation.
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