'Rotten Egg' Smell Continues To Plague Kearny Residents

Residents in Kearny have complained for months about a strong, unpleasant smell occasionally wafting through the town, with the aroma more powerful on some days than others.

Mayor Al Santos in front of the Keegan Landfill in Kearny in February. Santos and residents say the landfill is the source of a sickening aroma affecting hundreds of households.
Photo Credit: *Facebook*

Paul Milo

04/01/2019 11:30 a.m.

Saturday and Sunday seemed to be especially bad.

Over the weekend Kearny residents described a smell like rotten eggs that was so potent, it forced people to close their windows. One man said he noticed it in the morning when he left town Saturday, and still detected it when he returned that night. A woman said her dogs were sickened by the stench.

In a word, the smell is "toxic," yet another woman said.

Residents and the town's longtime mayor, Al Santos, blame the persistent aroma on a gas, hydrogen sulfide, emanating from a 100-acre landfill maintained by the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority. In February, Santos said that more than 200 complaints about smells were logged, prompting Santos to call for the facility, the Keegan Landfill, to be temporarily closed.

The NJSEA has said that it is trying to determine the source of the smell, but has not concluded that the Keegan site is to blame.

Air quality around the landfill is monitored by the Hudson Regional Health Commission, which did not immediately reply to questions Monday.

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