Corrosive gas leak causes building to be evacuated

Hazardous materials crews responded Wednesday to a situation in northwest Charlotte that caused a building to be evacuated.

The incident began just before 4 p.m. at a business at Planters Industrial Park on the 3000 block of Planters Place, near West Trade Street.

According to police, phosphorus trichloride was leaking from somewhere in the building. The chemical is corrosive and is used to make herbicides, insecticides, plasticisers, oil additives and flame retardants.

Officials have not released much information about what happened, but police near the scene were wearing gas masks and were keeping media far back from the emptied building.

Around 4:15 p.m., the Charlotte Fire Department's Decontamination Unit arrived at the scene.

This story was originally published December 23, 2015 at 5:03 PM with the headline "Corrosive gas leak causes building to be evacuated."