Smoke & Mirrors

ChemCentral attorney Dan Brennan has told the Pitch that the company intends to help federal authorities, in any way, to clean up the site. But Brennan says he doesn't expect cleanup of the site to be too lengthy. "Was there any chemical that was dangerous to the public? No, there was not. It was a very low level of chemicals that were released that day."

Meanwhile, the only agency to conduct a review of its response to the fire was the Kansas City Fire Department. At 11 a.m. on March 9, the department held a meeting to discuss its response. According to a three-page report from that meeting, fire department higher-ups identified some areas that they could work on, like getting better maps of the area.

But overall, Dyer came to this conclusion about the response: "The incident worked very well."