TACOMA, Wash. (AP) -- A Postal Service center was evacuated Tuesday after a preliminary test indicated white powder found among some envelopes might be toxic. Later tests found no signs of a harmful biological substance.
State and fire department officials said tests by the Army National Guard and state health officials found no signs of any biotoxin. Samples will be sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for review.
Nearly 100 people were cleared from the building after the powder was found about 12:45 a.m. on a table where mail is processed, fire Capt. Jolene Davis said. The center reopened Tuesday evening.
There was a similar scare later Tuesday morning at a Postal Service distribution center in Tukwila, just south of Seattle. Tests on a granular substance found in a mail basket there were negative, said Jeff Scobba, a U.S. Postal Inspection Service spokesman.
Elsewhere, six Postal Service workers were taken to a hospital in Fort Myers, Fla., after they were exposed to an unknown white powder when they opened a mail container unloaded from a FedEx plane at Southwest Florida International Airport.
Gerry McKiernan, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service in Washington, said Tuesday night that tests on the substance found there also were negative.
