Around 20 workers at a chemical plant in the Czech town of Decine suffered harm after a phenol leak from a truck tanker. “There are around 20 victims, two of them are in a severe and even critical condition,” an emergency services spokesman told AFP. The incident happened early in the morning at the Hemitex plant, which employs around 90 people. Work at the plant was immediately suspended after the leak. Some people suffered after inhaling phenol and other poisonous chemicals, also known as carbolic acid; while others sustained skin burns, according to the spokesman. The leak was caused by a broken hose, through which the phenol had been pumped, said officials in Decine. The town in the northwestern Czech Republic near the German border has 50,000 inhabitants.