A Brooklyn firehouse where firefighters have been experiencing strange growths on their hands and miscarriages among their wives has been temporarily closed after tests found 24 potentially cancer-causing contaminants in the air.
The FDNY tests, recently conducted in Red Hook's Ladder Co. 131-Engine Co. 279, found particles of hazardous materials, such as benzene, vinyl chloride and chloroform, that exceed federal Environmental Protection Agency recommended levels, a source said.
Although EPA standards are set for the home and not the workplace, FDNY officials - who said they're confident that a "sufficient level" of fire protection would still be available for all of Red Hook - made the call to shutter the house as of March 3 until more tests can be run, said FDNY spokesman Frank Gribbon.
"We're erring on the side of caution," Gribbon said.
Harry Gillan, 69, a retired firefighter who worked in the house, located on Smith and Lorraine streets, from 1957 to 1989, said, "I'm happy something is being done."
Gillan, who beat colon cancer, said he and 10 colleagues who worked there developed cancer between 1983 and 1995 - and three died from it.
He said the wives of firefighters stationed at what he and many of his colleagues called "cancer house," miscarried more than 20 times over the past 10 years.
Last November, when The Post broke the story, firefighters said two wives had miscarried in the past six months, and fibrous growths began appearing on the hands of firefighters.
Firefighters have wondered if the industrial Red Hook air was responsible.
The firehouse, built in 1912, is near a Brooklyn-Queens Expressway overpass, a garbage-transfer station, a fuel depot, a cement factory, an asphalt plant and a smoked-fish factory.
FDNY and Uniformed Firefighters Association officials with firefighters last Monday to tell them they would immediately be relocated to nearby companies.
Ladder Co. 131 is now sharing quarters with Red Hook's Ladder Co. 101, Engine Co. 202 and Battalion 32, while Engine Co. 279 is housed with Cobble Hill's Engine Co. 204.
