By NANCY KIMBALL

The Daily Inter Lake

A little more than 2 ounces of spilled mercury caused a big commotion when Kalispell's Meridian Road post office was ordered to be closed during the Presidents Day weekend.

At about 2:30 p.m. Saturday, a delivery-van driver found the silvery liquid seeping from a package loaded into the van full of mail. That led to a chain of response that eventually evacuated and locked up the entire facility, reportedly for 26 hours.

No injuries came from the incident.

But the potential cost of paying holiday overtime Monday for workers to catch up on sorting mail, flying three hazardous-materials specialists in from Milwaukee and hiring a professional service to decontaminate the area could do some damage to the Postal Service budget.

That's not to mention the Kalispell police officers who were called for security, the 13 Kalispell Fire Department personnel who helped isolate and retrieve the mercury, the Office of Emergency Services director and hazardous materials teams, the two fire engines and ambulance which responded initially, and the general-alarm call for backup at the Kalispell fire station.

Postal officials did not answer phones Monday, a federal holiday. But, according to an Associated Press wire report submitted by KOFI Radio's George Ostrom, postal workers were on the job Monday, sorting mail to get ready for what would be typical delivery today.

Kalispell police Patrol Sgt. Mark Mulcahy said it all started with a local physician ordering something in the mail. Something inside that package broke and leaked, he said.

Early reports indicated it was an old blood-pressure cuff ordered on eBay.

But fire Captain Dave Dedman said that, by tracking the return address on the package, authorities discovered it was a wall thermometer that contained mercury.

Ostrom said the van driver discovered the small amount of mercury leaking from the package in the van, and notified postal officials. The van was driven into the building, and the shift supervisor decided to evacuate the building at about 3 p.m.

Dedman said that's when the call came in at the Fire Department, which sent two engines and an ambulance.

But when it was verified to be a hazmat situation, the department called for a general alarm to bring in back-up help at the station and called in the hazmat team. The team of fire personnel from Kalispell and other departments donned splash suits for entering and decontamination.

Early reports also indicated that a Great Falls hazmat team was on the scene. But apparently it was Kalispell firefighters returning from a Great Falls funeral, Dedman said.

Mark Peck, director of the Office of Emergency Services, was on the scene, Dedman said. He could not be reached at his office Monday for further information.

When the source of the leaking mercury was pinpointed, hazmat team members isolated the area around the package and called in a commercial, contracted clean-up crew.

Dedman said the call lasted for just more than three hours and 20 minutes.

Ostrom said a device for measuring mercury levels in the air was located in Milwaukee, Wis. Three people were flown from Milwaukee to Missoula then driven to Kalispell, where they apparently detected no dangerous mercury fumes in the air, Ostrom said.

He also said a shift supervisor told him the Milwaukee specialists took the mercury with them.

Dedman said mercury poses hazards when it's inhaled or ingested. In order to be inhaled, liquid mercury would have to be heated to a temperature high enough to turn it to a gas.