Federal officials are now trying to find the source of a strange smell that’s been lingering at a Waterloo school for the past week. Officials from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency are in Waterloo today, investigating the lingering odor at Logan Middle School.
In the last week, students and faculty members have been reporting a "strange sewer gas smell" inside the building and symptoms of nausea, light-headedness, or red eyes. Classes at Logan were canceled three times last week after the smell was first reported on Wednesday.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources, Black Hawk County Health officials, and the Waterloo Hazardous Materials Team all took air-quality samplings at the school last week and found no signs of indoor pollution.
Now, state and local officials have asked the E-P-A to further investigate. The feds are at the school collecting indoor air samples for a wide variety of organic pollutants. Laboratory tests are expected to be made public in seven to ten days.