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By URIAH KISER
DALE CITY, Va. — Hazmat crews were called Friday night to a home once known for its elaborate Christmas decorations, after swimming pool chemicals made a man sick.
Dale City Volunteer Fire Department crews rushed to a single family home at 4492 Dale Boulevard after 7:30 p.m. when a man who was in the process of moving to a new home uncovered pool chemicals in a storage container in his back yard. Not knowing exactly what they were, the man – who asked not to be identified – moved the chemicals. Then they began to bubble and omit a strange odor, and the man’s nose began to burn, he said. So he called a friend, a volunteer firefighter, who then told him to call 911.
“I don’t really know where the chemicals came from. I think they were left here by the owner of the house, before we moved in,” he said.
The victim was the only one home at the time, and he refused treatment from fire and rescue personnel. He looked on from the street as fire crews, decked out in Hazmat gear, checked his home and made sure it was OK for him to go back inside.
The home has an in-ground swimming pool in its backyard for summertime fun, but was long known for its large pine tree that at Christmastime which was transformed into one of the largest holiday decorations in Dale City. The display often won holiday decorating contests awarded by the Dale City Civic Association.
The owners of the home moved out about two years ago and rented the home to the man whose nose was burned by the chemicals. He’s been forced to a home to a new house down the street, he said.
A portion of Dale Boulevard between Glendale Road and Greenwood Drive was reduced to one lane as fire crews and police investigated the incident.
*This story has been revised.
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