By Ali Jamal Awad, Founder and Managing Partner, CEO Lawyer Personal Injury Law Firm · Marietta, Georgia | Last reviewed: October 2026
Where things stand: More than two years after the September 29, 2024 fire at BioLab’s Conyers plant, the deadline to file most individual personal injury lawsuits in Georgia has passed. Property damage claims generally have longer to run, minors’ claims are treated differently, and several class actions remain pending in federal court. Anyone with an unresolved claim should find out now which deadline applies to them.
What Happened at the Conyers Plant
The fire began early on a Sunday morning at BioLab’s Plant 12 warehouse in Conyers, in Rockdale County, about 30 miles east of Atlanta. The U.S. Chemical Safety Board’s final investigation report, released on July 21, 2026, found that a corroded sprinkler component failed around 5:00 a.m. and sent water onto stored pool-treatment chemicals, setting off a reaction that produced heat, fire, and a toxic plume containing chlorine, hydrogen chloride, and bromine.
The CSB’s findings are significant for anyone with a claim:
- The warehouse held nearly 14 million pounds of reactive chemicals, more than twice the roughly 6.2 million pounds reported to local officials.
- A December 2023 inspection had identified more than 1,100 corroded sprinkler heads.
- About 17,000 people were evacuated, roughly 90,000 were initially told to shelter in place, nightly shelter-in-place warnings continued for 17 days, and schools closed for nearly two weeks.
The company, a subsidiary of KIK Consumer Products, stopped operations at the Conyers facility in May 2025. While the CSB does not assign legal liability, its findings about known corrosion and underreported storage are the kind of evidence that can matter in negligence and punitive damages claims.
Deadlines Have Changed Everything
| Claim type | General Georgia deadline | Status for the 2024 fire |
| Personal injury (O.C.G.A. § 9-3-33) | 2 years | Expired for most adults on or about September 29, 2026 |
| Damage to real property (§ 9-3-30) | 4 years | Generally open until about September 2028 |
| Damage to personal property (§ 9-3-31) | 4 years | Generally open until about September 2028 |
| Injured minors (§ 9-3-90) | Tolled until age 18 | Often still open |
Some situations fall outside these general rules. A person who was already named in a lawsuit filed before the deadline, or whose illness did not appear until later, may still have options, and Georgia courts have applied discovery principles in limited latent-injury cases. Whether membership in a proposed class action preserved an individual’s deadline is also a fact-specific legal question. These are reasons to get a prompt case review, not reasons to assume a claim is still alive.
Who May Have a Claim
Residents near the plant who suffered health effects or property contamination. Business owners whose property was damaged. First responders exposed while working the scene: in June 2026, two Rockdale County deputies filed suit alleging BioLab did not disclose what was burning, leaving them without proper protection. Workers at BioLab face a different rule, because Georgia’s workers’ compensation law generally makes workers’ compensation the exclusive remedy against one’s own employer, though claims against other responsible companies may still be possible.
Types of Compensation in a BioLab Claim
Medical Expenses
Emergency care for respiratory, eye, throat, and skin symptoms, follow-up visits, prescriptions, and treatment for anxiety or trauma linked to the evacuation can all be part of a damages claim. Because this fire occurred before April 21, 2025, the new medical-expense evidence rules in Georgia’s 2025 tort reform law generally do not apply to these claims, although other procedural changes, such as the right to request separate trial phases on liability and damages, may.
Medical Monitoring
One of the most closely watched questions is whether exposed residents without a current diagnosis can obtain court-ordered health screening. In Bio-Lab, Inc. v. Tartt (Aug. 18, 2026), the Georgia Supreme Court answered a federal court’s certified questions only in part. It explained the general Georgia requirements for equitable relief but declined to decide whether a medical monitoring injunction is available in this case, leaving that decision to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. The issue remains unresolved.
Property Damage
Cleanup and decontamination, replacement of contaminated belongings, and in some cases a reduction in property value can be recovered when the fire caused physical harm to the property. Testing records, photographs, and receipts are central to these claims, which generally remain within Georgia’s four-year property deadline.
Economic Losses
Lost wages from illness, hotel and relocation costs during the evacuation, and business interruption are commonly claimed. Georgia’s economic loss rule can make purely financial losses harder to recover when there was no physical injury or property damage, so documenting a physical connection matters.
Pain, Suffering, and Emotional Distress
Physical pain, emotional distress, and loss of enjoyment of life can be compensated when tied to a physical injury. Georgia’s impact rule generally limits emotional distress damages in negligence cases that lack a physical injury, which is one reason fear of future illness is usually pursued through medical monitoring rather than as a standalone claim.
Punitive Damages
Under O.C.G.A. § 51-12-5.1, punitive damages require clear and convincing evidence of willful misconduct, wantonness, or an entire want of care showing conscious indifference to consequences. In most cases that are not product liability claims, punitive damages are capped at $250,000 unless the defendant acted with specific intent to cause harm.
The Litigation Today
Lawsuits over the fire include a consolidated federal class action focused largely on property and economic damages and medical monitoring, individual injury suits, and the deputies’ case. Just before the second anniversary, two new proposed federal class actions, Baron v. Bio-Lab and Gregg v. Bio-Lab, were filed against BioLab, KIK, related entities, and private equity owner Centerbridge Partners, seeking damages, medical monitoring, and environmental testing. Neither had been certified as a class action as of late September 2026.
Families and business owners trying to understand how these cases might apply to them can review a focused overview for victims of BioLab explosion claims and the documents that support them. Find Attorneys’ general explanation of how personal injury settlements work covers what happens if a case resolves.
What to Gather Now
- Medical records showing the date symptoms began and any treatment
- Evacuation or shelter-in-place documentation, including hotel and travel receipts
- Home testing results, cleanup invoices, and photographs of contamination
- Employer records of missed work or business closure
- Any notice received about a class action, including deadlines to opt out or file a claim
Most injury attorneys handle these cases on a contingency basis, and Find Attorneys’ overview of lawyers’ fees for personal injury cases explains how those arrangements typically work.
Disclaimer
This article provides general information about claims arising from the 2024 BioLab fire in Conyers, Georgia. It is not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Deadlines and available damages depend on each person’s facts, and litigation over the fire is ongoing. Anyone with a potential claim should consult a licensed Georgia attorney promptly.
