PRAGUE, Aug 24: Several hundred kilograms of highly poisonous chlorine gas leaked into the air in Friday’s accident at a flooded chemicals plant in the Czech Republic, the company running the factory said on Saturday.

The leak, the second in a week after the worst floods ever recorded swept through the Czech Republic, set off alarms in the town of Neratovice, 20kms north of Prague, and several other towns and villages.

News agency CTK said the accident happened when workers at Spolana, a unit of chemicals group Unipetrol, pumped fluid chlorine gas out of a storage unit which had been damaged in the flood.

There were no casualties in the accident thanks to dispersion of the gas, which is lethal in high concentrations and was used as chemical weapon in World War One.

The Czech Radio reported the gas burned trees and crops in surrounding areas.

Spolana has been the main environmental hazard in the Czech flooding, due to large amounts of lethal chemicals at risk and contamination of ground and buildings on its premises from dozens of years of operation under lax standards during the Communist era which ended in 1989.

The company has taken harsh criticism from environmental groups and also government officials for delays in informing the public about the situation at the plant in the past week. CTK said police were investigating the issue.

Unipetrol Chairman Pavel Svarc has admitted there were certain delays in information flows but said there was no threat to the public.—Reuters