Smelly places (Billings, Missoula, Great Falls: living, shop, oil refinery)

[wannago]

Through my years of driving around, I have found certain smells that I could not live anywhere near.
One happens to be a turkey farm, another is a "Potlatch" factory.

Don't get me wrong, here. I actually kind-of like the smell of cow farms; we used to always call that smell "fresh air". So those types of smells are no problem. It's the really awful ones...and everyone's nose is different on what it can handle and can't, so I'm just wondering if any of youze have a problem with a smell near you.

I read somewhere that there is a smelly factory close to Havre.

What is the source of the odor? And where are others?

[ElkHunter]

I've only been to Havre a couple of times and both times there was nothing out of the ordinary. Course, that doesn't mean there isn't nothing there, I might have just been lucky with the wind.

Another bad smell is a wood chip/plywood/pressboard plant. I used to live in Washington and worked in Portland. Had to go past one every day. Wow. Windows up, shut off air or heat so there's no outside air and it still brought you to tears.

[jimj]

It's interesting you bring up the plywood plants and such. We have one in town and it doesn't smell at all. A little noisy sometimes when they blow off excess steam but other than that you'd not notice they're here. The biggest smells we have here is skunks and tourist cologne....
Having delivered and picked up haz mat at wood plants and mills what generally is the smelliest is the pulp plants. The chemicals envolved to make pulp for paper stink to high heaven.

[GEORGIAINMT]

When my daughter was a little girl and we'd pass by the oil refinery in Laurel she always said "ewwwwwww, stinky town!!!!", so Laurel was always known as "stinky town" to us. Guess what? I moved here! Like anything else, I guess your nose becomes accustomed to its surroundings because I don't even notice the smell at all. My husband calls it "the smell of money!". Billings can also get very smelly from a combination of the refineries, the sewer plant, and mostly the sugar beet factory during the time of the year it is going. But when I lived there it didn't seem bad very often. I lived in Thermopolis, Wyoming for 13 years and I wish I had a $ for every time I heard someone say how bad it smelled. The mineral springs/hot pools there really put off an odor. But again, living there we didn't even notice it. As for the "wood" smell spoke of earlier, I have a friend who works at one of the plants in Missoula and HE always smells bad like a really strong woody smell!

[rickers]

Smelly industries I would prefer not to live close to ;
Hog farm,
Pulp mill,
slaughter house,
dairy farm,
oil refinery,
tannery,
head shop ! eweeee ! petulie oil !

[jimj]

One of the worst.... Mushroom farm!

[rubydi]

I think the worst is a stockyard!! Ever been to Shepherd?

[pmsprincess]

Here's one that no one has mentioned...ever try living near a whiskey distillery??? The over whelming smell of whiskey night after night was more than enough to put me off all liquor...it really was the pits - trust me, on a hot humid still night the intense smell of Seagrams was worse than any chicken farm anywhere!

[JetMech72]

Havre, smelly? I haven't lived in Havre for very long, but I haven't smelled anything bad here....they're not even using asphalt on the new highway...all concrete...no smell.

But, I do know of one notorious location. Most of us might remember back in the day, when Smurfit-Stone used to be called Waldorf. Smurfit-Stone is a cardboard and paper mill between Frenchtown and Missoula and when I was growing up in Hamilton (60-some miles south) we could smell that rotten place,,,,ewwwww...gives me chills just thinking about that smell. The plant has, since, been retrofitted to reduce the smell, but every now and then it can kick out a pretty pungent smell.


Oh, and GeorgiaInMT, Great Falls has one of those "Stinky Towns" too, the refinery at Black Eagle. It never fails to get me, if I'm driving into G-Falls by myself, and get near the refinery....there is a split second where I think to myself; "Did I just let one go?" Then, it hits me like a ton of bricks and I realize that it is the refinery....very sickening smell.

[rangerider]

Originally Posted by GEORGIAINMT

When my daughter was a little girl and we'd pass by the oil refinery in Laurel she always said "ewwwwwww, stinky town!!!!", so Laurel was always known as "stinky town" to us. Guess what? I moved here! Like anything else, I guess your nose becomes accustomed to its surroundings because I don't even notice the smell at all. My husband calls it "the smell of money!". Billings can also get very smelly from a combination of the refineries, the sewer plant, and mostly the sugar beet factory during the time of the year it is going. But when I lived there it didn't seem bad very often. I lived in Thermopolis, Wyoming for 13 years and I wish I had a $ for every time I heard someone say how bad it smelled. The mineral springs/hot pools there really put off an odor. But again, living there we didn't even notice it. As for the "wood" smell spoke of earlier, I have a friend who works at one of the plants in Missoula and HE always smells bad like a really strong woody smell!

My wife and I spent a year and change in Billings some time ago; lived out on 24th and Central so the prevailing winds took care of us some of the time. But still, I never did get used to it and am real glad to be 30 miles upwind of Bozeman. We have a lot of cattle around, but that doesn't bother me in the least - grew up with it. Guess it all depends what you're sensitive to...