One worker dead, others sick at El Dorado Chemical Plant

Twelve employees of a chemical plant in El Dorado got sick Thursday morning, one of which died Friday morning. Now investigators are trying to determine the cause. Workers at Great Lakes Chemical Plant met in the break room before work and began to complain of burning eyes and nostrils, sick stomaches and diarrhea among other things. They were taken to the hospital and six of them were released. Officials at Great Lakes say they have taken precautionary methods of monitoring who goes in and out of of certain areas. There were rumors that an explosion or fire had occurred, but officials say those reports were false and that as far as they know there was no incident or chemical leak. The coroner says 53-year old Buddy Atkinson of Magnolia died after suffering from complications from Bromine toxicity. (Dan Redmond1/Great Lakes Chemica) "We lock down the areas to keep people from moving in and out of areas that we don`t want them moving into until we secure everything and know exactly what`s happening, but we have done significant monitoring in the work areas and there are no chemicals out of the ordinary that are present." While the plant says their testing has shown no abnormalities. However, an area of the plant remains closed until the exact source of the problem can be determined.