Officials say air and water now reported safe after SPS Technologies fire; residents press for more testing and greater transparency

Jenkintown — Local officials, first responders and SPS Technologies told residents at a packed public forum Tuesday that air and water monitoring conducted since last week’s SPS Technologies plant fire have shown readings within the benchmarks set by responding agencies, but residents pressed repeatedly for more testing detail and clearer transparency about debris and surface sampling.

Dr. Tagus, introduced by the board as the district’s superintendent, opened the hour-long forum by thanking staff, students and first responders and saying the district had sought additional information from the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). "We have been told that the air quality is clear and fine to breathe both inside our schools and outside in the community," Dr. Tagus said, adding that she asked for third‑party air monitoring as an added level of assurance and that she had raised concerns with elected officials.

Police Chief Scott, who led the borough’s incident command, gave a timeline of the response: the explosion and fire were reported Monday night at about 9:45 p.m.; search crews accounted for about 60 people who were in the facility; interior firefighting was halted when conditions became unsafe and command shifted to exterior master-stream operations; hazmat teams began continuous air monitoring that ran for roughly 30 hours, and a…