Just after New Year's revellers at the gaming facility at Sudbury Downs in Chelmsford rang in 2018, the fire alarm went off and the building was evacuated. It turns out, though, there was no fire at the casino.
Smoke from a nearby fire that destroyed a mobile home — nobody was injured in that blaze, according to the fire department — got into the building's HVAC system, creating a smell of smoke.
“Shortly after midnight on Jan. 1 the facility activated a fire alarm and began a controlled evacuation of the gaming floor due to the strong odour of smoke,” said Rob Mitchell, a spokesperson for Gateway Casinos, which has operated the gaming facility since last spring.
“The fire department attended and confirmed that the smell of smoke originated from a house fire in the area and shut down the HVAC system as to not draw the air into the facility.
“The smell quickly dissipated, and the system was powered back up one unit at a time.”
He said there was also confusion because some people believed that steam coming off of the HVAC system was actually smoke. “But in fact it wasn't smoke, it was the extreme cold — it was steam,” Mitchell said.
The gaming facility was reopened by 2 a.m., and the New Year's festivities continued.
“Folks stuck around,” he said. “Well over 130 people returned to enjoy their New Year's Eve. We had a luncheon buffet and an evening buffet and ongoing New year's eve festivities. They were interrupted for this brief segue because there was this odour of smoke.”
Fire officials congratulated the staff at the gaming facility for making the decision to evacuate, Mitchell said.
“The fire marshal was very laudatory of our call and commended our general manager on site for acting promptly,” he said.
