The Margin

Aliyia Jones moved back to Camden after a train derailment displaced her from her previous home. She thought she was coming for relief. She found EMR instead.

Comment CAMDEN to get the story’s

Since the fires at EMR’s scrap metal facility, she’s been in and out of the ER for asthma and shortness of breath.

After the February 2025 fire, she couldn’t sleep. She started therapy for the first time and was diagnosed with PTSD and panic disorder. In April, she quit her job.

“I couldn’t concentrate. I was making mistakes on the clock,” she said.

Dr. Jubril Oyeyemi of Camden County explains how fires like these don’t just damage lungs; they balloon into a cascade of physical and mental health crises for residents.

"You don't want to mess your lungs up, dude."

There have been 14 fires at a Camden scrap metal facility since 2020. The workers are rallying to keep it open, even while 191 of them live in the same city bearing the toxic burden.

The tension at the heart of this story is both regulatory and deeply human, a complexity that The Margin and explored for “Up in Smoke," an investigation by Katrina Janco and Sophia Schmidt.

Read the full investigation now: https://themargin.us/features/up-in-smoke