Fourteen employees of a US animal shelter were hospitalised after the FBI used an incinerator on site to burn two pounds of methamphetamine.
The staff and around 75 cats and dogs had to be evacuated from the Yellowstone Valley Animal Shelter as the building filled with drug-laced smoke.
The incinerator, which belongs to the city of Billings, Montana, is usually used to dispose of euthanised animals. However, it is also utilised by law enforcement to discard drug evidence.
Shelter director Triniti Halverson said the smoke poured in within minutes of the crematorium fire, forcing workers to evacuate dozens of animals.
Halverson said in a statement that she was unaware that they were ‘disposing of extremely dangerous narcotics on site.’
'My team and my animals have been confirmed as exposed to meth,' she said.
Many employees put on masks and helped get the animals out, exposing themselves to smoke for over an hour and consequently feeling sick.
The staff members later went to the emergency room, where they spent about three hours in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber to combat the effects of smoke inhalation.
The incident was caused when smoke was pushed in the wrong direction because of negative pressure, according to Assistant City Administrator Kevin Iffland.
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