Discovery of 'highly volatile' chemical prompts evacuation of buildings at St. Boniface Hospital

A research building and an attached MRI facility at St. Boniface Hospital have reopened after the buildings were evacuated Friday, asthe Winnipeg Police Service's bomb unit dealt with a volatile chemical substance.

Officers were called to the Albrechtsen Research Centre around 10:40 a.m. to assist with the removal of the substance, police spokesperson Const. Claude Chancy told CBC News.

Chancy said the substance was chemical in nature. He referred all other questions to the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority.

In a memo to hospital staff, provided to CBC News by the health authority, officials said that during a "routine laboratory decommissioning" at the Albrechtsen Research Centre, a container was found that warranted further investigation.

"This product has a legitimate research usage and was on site for the purposes of that legitimate usage," the hospital'smemo states in part.

"It appears upon initial investigation that the product may have been in the lab for some time and had degraded over time into a form that is considered highly volatile."

Officials said they ordered the evacuation known as a code green of the facilities "out of an abundance of caution." Code greens were called for the Albrechtsen Research Centre and theDr. Andrei Sakharov MRI Centre between 11 a.m. and noon.

Chancy said afterofficers arrived at the research centre, they calledthe police service's bomb unit, which removed the substance just after 2 p.m. The hospital said it received the all-clear from police around 2:30 p.m.

The hospital issued a followup memo to staff shortly after 4 p.m., givingthe all-clear to reopen both the research centre and MRI centre.

MRI services were suspended while the centre was evacuated. The memo to staff indicated that urgentMRIs forpatients will resume at 7 p.m. Friday, while regular outpatient MRI appointments will resume on Saturday.

The memos stressed there was "no danger to the larger hospital facility."

Chancy said the incident has been deemed not criminal in nature.

The hospital's memo said its health and safety team "already has processes in place to ensure hazardous chemicals are inventoried and accounted for going forward, to mitigate the risk of a similar situation occurring in the future."