Hazmat Team responds to unknown substance in Downtown Spokane

The Spokane City Fire Dept. and its specialized Hazardous-Materials Team responded to 717 W. Sprague Ave., the Washington Trust Financial Center Building, to a reported Haz-Mat incident. The units were dispatched at 9:56 AM on Friday, May 9th to investigate an incident involving an unknown type of material delivered to the Financial Center through the mail. Upon arrival of the Fire Dept. resources they were briefed by employees of the Financial Center and based on those employees accounts the Haz-Mat Team was compelled to investigate this incident as a credible threat to the citizens in the building. Access to the building was denied and the area where the material had been placed was secured until a definitive identification of the substance could be provided, in order to do that the Haz-Mat Team had to don their protective suits, gather a sample of the material, and have that sample analyzed using one of their pieces of highly technical testing equipment.

The material was identified by their equipment as Molybdenum, a material defined by CAMEO (Computer-Aided Management of Emergency Operations) as, "a chemical element, it is a hard, high-melting, high-density dark gray metal or black powder. Insoluble in water. Used to make structural alloys; used as a catalyst. Molybdenum dust and fumes can irritate the eyes and respiratory tract." The amount of Molybdenum found in the envelope used to mail the substance was determined by the Haz-Mat Team to be less than half a teaspoon. Once the material had been identified it was sealed in a container along with the envelope, removed from the premises, given to a representative of the U.S. Postal Service, and the building was re-opened to the general public. There were no reports of any injuries or harmful exposure to the material by any civilians in the building or to any of the firefighters who responded to this incident. Seven pieces of fire equipment and four Command Vehicles with a total of 32 firefighters initially responded to this incident, some of the resources were placed back in service as the incident stabilized and the need for resources diminished.

PROBABLE CAUSE: Unknown
DAMAGE EXTENT: No apparent damage noted.
DOLLAR LOSS: 0
FIREFIGHTER RESPONSE: 32
MUTUAL AID: None Given