Jail employee hospitalized, 5 others treated after carbon monoxide leak at Fulton jail

FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — The Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat says a carbon monoxide leak shut down the kitchen at the Fulton County Jail and sent a contract employee to the hospital Monday night.

The sheriff says that the Atlanta Fire Rescue Department shut down the kitchen and treated five other contract employees at the jail.

Labat says all the affected employees are OK and one drove herself to Grady Memorial Hospital where she was admitted.

Labat says, while carbon monoxide is odorless and colorless, nausea and other symptoms triggered the emergency response which included an immediate evacuation of the kitchen by Atlanta Fire Rescue soon after firefighters arrived.

He says a private contractor confirmed a high level of carbon monoxide in the kitchen. He says the leak did not affect other areas of the jail.

The sheriff said the leak is yet another symptom of an aging, underfunded jail with infrastructure problems that have led to other inmate health problems and stabbings with so-called shanks made from parts of the jail. He says he immediately notified the Board of Commissioners and county attorney of the situation Monday night.

Labat says the jail kitchen serves close to 8,000 meals daily and sometimes as many as 11,000 meals a day. He says six of the eight massive kettles in the kitchen were down as of 12 p.m. Tuesday.

He says the contractor pinpointed one kettle as the source of the leak and as of 12 p.m. emergency workers were still working to fix the problem. He says the jail needs at least four working kettles to prepare enough meals to serve the roughly 2,500 inmates currently held at the jail.

Labat said the jail had some food prepared ahead of time in the event of emergencies. The Cobb County Sheriff’s Office, which uses the same food vendor in its jail, is assisting with food preparation and food is also being purchased from outside sources.

The sheriff says it is too soon to know when the kitchen will be usable again.