MECCA, Calif. – Students at Saul Martinez Elementary School had just piled in from recess when the principal began to field alarming calls: a powerful, propane-like stench had swept over the school grounds and was bringing children and teachers alike to their knees.
By the time it was over, as many as 40 people had been treated by paramedics for headaches, nausea, dizziness and asthma attacks.
During the coming months, state air quality regulators would field more than 200 additional complaints about the "rotten egg" fumes overtaking this dusty agricultural community at the northern tip of the Salton Sea and tracked the smell to a soil recycling facility that leases tribal land less than two miles from the school.
Authorities responded in force: Federal environmental regulators ordered Western Environmental, Inc., to temporarily stop operating, local air quality officials slapped it with a violation and the state began checking trucks entering the site for hazardous materials. The director of the state environmental agency called ending the odor the No. 1 priority.