A school was evacuated over a ‘strange odor.’ It was pumpkin spice air freshener.

By Lindsey Bever October 6 at 9:58 AM

Students at a Baltimore high school had gotten a whiff of something weird. ... During class Thursday afternoon, students at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School started to smell a “strange odor.”

Some of them began to cough and have trouble breathing, so students and staff members were evacuated from the building, and the fire department was called to investigate the cause. ... “Emergency medical technicians evaluated several staff members and students, some of whom were treated on the scene,” the school said in a statement. “Five members of our community were transported to area hospitals as a precautionary measure.”

Cristo Rey Jesuit High President Bill Heiser said, at first, some thought the smell was from a burned out lightbulb. ... “It was a smell that they certainly weren’t used to,” he told the Baltimore Sun. “It appeared to be getting stronger.”

As it turned out, the strange odor was coming from a common seasonal source: It was “this plug-in air freshener that basically puts out the odor every so many seconds, and it’s pumpkin spice,” Baltimore Fire Chief Roman Clark told NBC affiliate WBAL.
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Lindsey Bever is a general assignment reporter for The Washington Post. Follow @lindseybever