A chemical leak at Six Flags' Splashtown waterpark in Spring, Texas near Houston left 26 people transported to the hospital and dozens more reportedly injured on Saturday, officials said.
HazMat crews and fire officials quickly responded to the scene and began treating and decontaminating patients who were suffering from respiratory distress before shuttering the park, officials said.
The park will remain closed while an investigation is conducted and and safety protocols are reviewed.
Officials said 26 people were transported by an ambulance bus to a local hospital, including a woman who was in labor, while 39 people refused hospital treatment.
'Several hours ago we were dispatched to the Splashtown park and a normal Saturday turned out a lot differently,' Spring Fire Chief Scott Seifert said during a press conference on Saturday evening.
'With the patients that were brought to us, we decontaminated well over 60 people with our ladder truck. We went ahead and had them all walk through there and then they were analyzed by Cypress Creek EMS.'
Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said officials are not saying exactly what chemical it was 'because it's not clear right now but something obviously went wrong'
The park will remain closed while an investigation is conducted and and safety protocols are reviewed
Officials said 26 people were transported by an ambulance bus to a local hospital, including a woman who was in labor, while 39 people refused hospital treatment
Seifert said the patients suffered respiratory distress like difficulty breathing but they didn't see any patients with chemical burns
Chief Seifert explained that the fire department's ladder truck raised a nozzle and sprayed water down on an area about 15 feet people in order to decontaminate the park's patrons.
'They walk through there and they basically massage their eyes and things like that to get any chemicals out of their eyes if they are affected. No soap or nothing like that,' he said.
Seifert said the patients suffered respiratory distress like difficulty breathing but they didn't see any patients with chemical burns.
However, he acknowledged 'it is possible' for patients to have experienced burning sensations in their skin 'depending on the amount of chemical' when asked by another outlet to respond to claims from one woman who said she suffered burns.
'Just recently we learned that the chemical combination was about 35 percent sulfuric acid and 10 to 13 percent bleach,' Seifert said.
Captain Richard Lawhorn with the Harris County Hazardous Materials Team said the agency's goal in responding was 'to make sure that the chemical was still not active' and 'to make sure that the conditions were not getting any worse.'
Lawhorn explained that the HazMat team then assisted Six Flags crews in securing the chemicals 'in, for the most part, a controlled system.'
The HazMat official explained that the park's pools operate on a pH balance system where a pH balance of 7 is what they consider
