2nd fire hits recycling plant: Damage insignificant but damage from last week’s 4-alarm fire is extensive

Workers used a loader and pushed smoldering material outside of the facility at 222 Shoreway Road where firefighters hosed it down until it went out, Herring said.

The fire was reported at about 11:35 p.m. Sunday.

The recycling center, however, has still not recovered from Wednesday night’s fire as workers were busy Monday cleaning up extensive water and smoke damage.

Wednesday’s fire started at 8:45 p.m. in a section of the facility that sorts out newspaper from cardboard. It caused extensive damage to the facility’s conveyance system that could take up to six months to fix, Herring said.

“Our guys made every effort to extinguish it but there was too much smoke and too much fire so we evacuated the building,” he said.

The fire grew quickly, he said.

It took 79 firefighters and 30 pieces of equipment about three hours to knock down the fire.

The facility’s sprinkler system kept the fire contained to the area where it started.

The fire started on the facility’s residential line and is shut down for now.

Firefighters had to get creative in battling the fire based on where it started inside the facility. The conveyance system spans about three floors and firefighters knocked it down from below and had to knock through a bay door to access the area, Herring said.

None of Recology’s standard collection operations for garbage, recycling or organics are expected to be affected as a result of the fire, according to Joe La Mariana, executive director of Rethinkwaste.

Rethinkwaste is a joint powers agency owned by 11 cities and the West Bay Sanitary District and contracts with Recology for collection.

Residential recycling will be handled by third-party processors until repairs are completed, Herring said.

The facility is operating although tours and school field trips are postponed for now until safety measures are back in place.

The building handles the processing of over 400 tons of various grades of paper, bottles and cans every day.

After Wednesday night’s fire, La Mariana said the agency’s top priority is worker safety.

“The site management and staff must be commended for their textbook execution of the facility’s emergency evacuation procedures. Equipment and building can always be repaired and replaced. Our friends and colleagues cannot,” La Mariana wrote in a statement.

Structural engineering inspections to the affected building, as well as equipment and operating system replacement assessments are being conducted to establish the full scope of damage, La Mariana wrote.

bill@smdailyjournal.com

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