CONYERS, Ga. (AP) — More than twice the amount of swimming pool chemicals as planned were improperly stored at a Georgia plant, setting conditions for a fire in 2024 that sent a huge plume of orange and black smoke into the sky and forced residents to shelter in place, a federal agency report concluded.
The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board found that components of a sprinkler system inside the BioLab plant “had been experiencing significant corrosion and leaking” since 2019. That was shortly after the company began storing the chemicals at the plant, the agency said in its final report on the fire Tuesday.
The huge sacks “would naturally off-gas chlorine fumes that combined with ambient humidity in the warehouse and condensed as hydrochloric acid droplets” on the metal sprinkler heads, the report said.
During a sprinkler inspection in December 2023 at the plant in Conyers, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) southeast of downtown Atlanta, over 1,100 sprinkler heads were found to be corroded, it said.
On the day of the fire, Sept. 29, 2024, a corroded sprinkler system component failed. Water came into contact with the chemicals and set off a decomposition reaction that generated heat, causing the release of smoke, toxic vapors and fire.
“The conditions and circumstances at the Bio-Lab Conyers warehouse were completely unacceptable,” Steve Owens, board chairperson, said. He said about 14 million pounds (6.3 million kilograms) of reactive chemicals were stored without proper safeguards.
“These hazardous chemicals were packaged in roughly 5,000 giant sacks, each weighing more than a ton, and some of them were stacked in such a way in the warehouse that responders were not able to keep the initial situation from developing into a catastrophic fire and massive plume of toxic smoke that put thousands of people potentially at risk.”
BioLab makes chemicals that kill algae and bacteria in water, primarily for swimming pools and hot tubs. The company is a subsidiary of Lawrenceville, Georgia-based KIK Consumer Products.
The company decided last year not to rebuild the plant. It was cited by the U.S. Department of Labor for six violations, including four serious ones, and more than $60,000 in proposed penalties.
The board called for expanded regulatory coverage of the chemicals.
A BioLab spokesperson said in an emailed statement that the company cooperated fully with the board and is reviewing the final report.
“We will carefully consider its recommendations as part of our ongoing commitment to safety and continuous improvement,” it said. “The health and safety of the communities where we operate is a top priority, and we worked collaboratively with first responders and relevant authorities to complete the emergency response in October 2024.
“We also completed the clean-up of the site affected by the fire and established resources dedicated to supporting area residents and business owners.”
FILE - Smoke billows from a fire at the BioLab facility in Conyers, Ga., Sunday, Sept. 29, 2024. (Ben Gray/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP, file)
BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — Hungary's former prime minister Viktor Orbán declared on Wednesday that he and his far-right Fidesz party will lead a peaceful “resistance” movement against what he called the tyrannical exercise of power by the country's new center-right government.
Orbán was defeated in a blowout election in April by Prime Minister Péter Magyar and his pro-European Tisza party, ending his 16 years in office. Since then, Orbán's nationalist Fidesz party has struggled to recover.
At a news conference outside party headquarters in Budapest, Orbán said a constitutional amendment passed last week by Tisza's majority in Parliament — which removed Hungary's Orbán-era president and set a 12-year term limit for members of Parliament — had “dismantled the rule of law and eliminated the system of checks and balances.”
The term limit, which applies retroactively, returns Hungary to a status similar to the final years of its Communist dictatorship in the late 1980s, Orbán asserted, “when there was no democracy in Hungary, there was no rule of law."
He said the term limit would exclude around half of his party coalition's sitting members from running in the next national elections set for 2030.
“This new political system is not a democracy, it is tyranny," Orbán said.
Since taking office in May, Magyar’s administration has gone to work dismantling what he calls Orbán’s “mafia” by removing numerous political appointees as well as heads of institutions viewed as having facilitated Orbán’s autocratic government.
The new administration suspended the news service of Hungary’s public television and radio — which Magyar argued served as a “propaganda factory” for Orbán’s party — and closed the Sovereignty Protection Office, an authority seen by Orbán’s opponents as a tool for intimidating critics and silencing independent media.
Fidesz has portrayed the moves as assaults on democracy and warned of an authoritarian system in the making. Tisza argues it is using its overwhelming electoral mandate to fulfill campaign promises, combat corruption and restore the rule of law that was eroded under Orbán.
On Wednesday, Orbán said his party considers any officials Tisza appoints to replace earlier appointees “illegitimate,” and announced his party's “Declaration of Resistance” to Magyar's government.
In the declaration, which Fidesz publicized late Tuesday, the party says that “from this day forward, our mission is to restore the democratic rule of law.”
“Every citizen has the right to stand against tyrannical rule,” the declaration reads. “Fidesz ... will use every peaceful means, both inside and outside Parliament, to resist the arbitrary exercise of power.”
It had few details but said it would assist “victims of the authoritarian regime” and document violations of the law.
After dominating Hungarian politics for nearly two decades, Fidesz has spiraled since its election loss. According to a June survey by pollster Medián and published by news site HVG.hu, Tisza's support stands at 60% among the country's entire population while Fidesz support has shrunk to 18%.
On Tuesday, prosecutors and investigators with Hungary’s tax authority raided offices housing Fidesz's data servers as part of a probe into suspected embezzlement and other crimes during Orbán's rule. Orbán alleged Wednesday that the raid was “on political orders,” and said such an action could occur “only in severe dictatorships.”
Fidesz has seen some of its most prominent politicians take a back seat or leave politics. Last week, its parliamentary caucus leader Gergely Gulyás stepped down from his role, while Orbán-era foreign minister Péter Szijjártó announced he was resigning from Parliament to take an executive position with Chinese carmaker BYD.
Former Hungarian Prime Minister and Chairman of the Fidesz party Viktor Orban, left, and new faction leader of the party Janos Boka hold a press conference in front of the Fidesz headquarters in Lendvay Street in Budapest, Hungary, Wednesday, July 22, 2026. (Robert Hegedus/MTI via AP)
Former Hungarian Prime Minister and Chairman of the Fidesz party Viktor Orban, left, and new faction leader of the party Janos Boka hold a press conference in front of the Fidesz headquarters in Lendvay Street in Budapest, Hungary, Wednesday, July 22, 2026. (Robert Hegedus/MTI via AP)
