Inferno at vinyl plant
Firefighters from across southern Niagara descend on Port Colborne blaze
A company that made patio furniture, above-ground pool and spa accessories was destroyed Tuesday after a massive fire spread throughout its Port Colborne facility along the Welland Canal.
More than 50 firefighters with tankers and pumpers from across the Niagara region responded to the blaze after Port Colborne Fire and Emergency Services called on mutual aid to battle the inferno at Vinyl Works Canada at 2174 Barber Dr.
“This is definitely the biggest fire with regard to the most involvement by multiple departments across the region that I have been involved with, and I’ve been in the fire service for 38 years,” said Port Colborne Deputy Chief Mike Bendia, adding firefighters arrived on scene at 7:39 a.m.
Welland Fire and Emergency Services, Fort Erie Fire Department, Wainfleet Fire and Emergency Services, Thorold Fire and Emergency Services, Pelham Fire Department and Niagara Falls Fire Department all sent manpower, tankers and pumpers to the scene.
There were also numerous fire chiefs and deputy fire chiefs on scene, as well as regional fire coordinator Bob Lymburner, chief of Pelham’s fire service.
Bendia said St. Catharines fire dispatch updated him constantly and said that other fire services across Niagara had manpower and vehicles ready to assist if needed.
“Fighting this fire wouldn’t have been possible without all of the other departments.”
Niagara Falls fire Chief Jim Boutilier said Niagara Falls sent one tanker with about three staff members to assist.
“When a fire service or a fire department like Port Colborne or any of us for that matter taxes out our abilities to fight the fire, then we can call on our neighbouring communities under mutual assistance,” he said.
“In this case, Port Colborne called for mutual aid because I understand the fire is an area where there’s no hydrants, or it’s too (far), so they’ve called for help with water supply — they’ve called for tankers, predicated on how may they would require to put the fire out,” said Boutilier.
Bendia said when he arrived on scene there was heavy fire on the south end of the building and it progressed down the side very quickly. He was surprised how fast the fire spread from the time he arrived, just in behind the first truck on the scene, Engine 1.
“There was heavy fire-involvement right from the beginning, there was no chance of making an interior attack. We went on the defensive almost right away.”
The heavy fire conditions caused a partial collapse of the building on the east side of the canal just 10 minutes into fighting the fire, making firefighters move their operations back farther from the building.
As fire progressed throughout the structure, from south to north, walls on both sides started to collapse and the whole building was down on the ground within 40 minutes of the call, making it more difficult to battle the blaze, Bendia said.
Adding to the fire in the beginning were small explosions caused by oxygen and acetylene tanks inside the building.
Bendia said when the building started to collapse, he saw a steel beam come down that was “twisted pretty good.”
“We had some extreme heat conditions,” he said, adding while he didn’t have an exact figure, the fire would have reached more than 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
Seven employees were in the building when the fire began and everyone made it out safely. No one was transported or required medical attention from Niagara Emergency Medical Services paramedics.
Bendia said the owner of the building was on scene and, while understandably upset, was very co-operative and agreeable to whatever firefighters needed to do to fight the fire.
The fire sent a large plume of smoke into the air, and saw smoke drift east toward Fort Erie. Smoke was reported to have been seen from as far away east as Buffalo, N.Y., and north to the south end of St. Catharines.
At an afternoon news conference just outside the gates of Vinyl Works, Bendia said the fire service was concerned with the smoke from the fire due to the materials used in making the vinyl furniture.
The smoke plume showed up on weather radar.
A call was placed to the Ministry of Environment, which sent an air-monitoring truck to the scene. That truck took a couple of hours to arrive, said Bendia, adding before that, Niagara Regional Police officers were out checking the areas east of the facility constantly to make sure smoke wasn’t coming down to the ground.
“Smoke is not good to breathe at any time. Thankfully, the smoke plume was going up very high in the sky and taking it away. If that smoke had banked down to the ground, we would have had more of a concern.”
Bendia said residents in the area of the smoke plume were advised to close their doors and windows even as the smoke subsided into the afternoon.
Air monitoring conducted by the MOE starting east of the fire and back toward the scene showed what was coming down to the ground was within acceptable levels.
“They are still out monitoring from what I understand,” Bendia said in the afternoon.
Port Colborne resident Charlene Crites said she lives about two streets away from the factory and noticed smoke filling the air at about 7:30 a.m.
“I just kind of was looking out the window to see how much snow there was and saw it,” she said.
“You couldn’t see anything but smoke. There is an odour out there, there is a smell.”
Crites stayed inside with her doors and the windows shut and was “just kind of keeping an eye on it.”
“There’s a lot of helicopters outside right now. There’s got to be at least two or three. I’ve got the blind open and I’m looking out the window. It’s more like grey smoke now, but when it started it was like black,” Crites said in the morning.
Bendia said the ministry also looked over water from the site that moved toward the Welland Canal. A large ditch and berms created by firefighters prevented any of that water from getting into the waterway, the deputy chief said. Vacuum trucks were being brought in to suck up the water.
“We have done a lot of work to make sure nothing gets in the canal.”
Firefighters on scene wore full protective gear as they battled the fire and heavy smoke conditions, but said the cold conditions made for difficult firefighting operations.
“Anyone in what we called the hot zone was wearing SCBA (self-contained breathing apparatus). It was very hard on the personnel,” Bendia said.
Cold was also a factor.
“Our biggest problem is that using water creates ice very quickly in these kinds of conditions and we have to be careful with our people on the ice and be very careful once they get wet and are exposed to the elements.”
He credited Welland Fire Chief Brian Kennedy for quickly arranging a Welland Transit bus to be brought to the scene so firefighters had some place warm to sit and rest and rehabilitate during the fire.
Vinyl Works’ location added to the tough conditions faced by firefighters, with only one access road in and tankers having to shuttle water back and forth from the Port Colborne fire hall, a distance of 2.5 kilometres.
Port Colborne city works crews were sanding Barber Drive at the entrance to the factory and ensuring no ice was building up at the fire hydrant at the fire hall.
Once firefighters were able to cut a hole in the ice at a former dry dock beside the factory and get a line in the water to draft from it, Bendia said, they were able to cut back on the amount of shuttling of tankers.
He expected to clear some of the tankers from the scene Tuesday afternoon and said firefighters would most likely be on scene until Wednesday afternoon as heavy equipment tore down what remained of the building and moved debris around to allow hotspots to be extinguished.
While Port Colborne’s firefighters were battling the fire, Bendia said, Wainfleet and Fort Erie firefighters were manning the city’s fire hall, ready to respond to any calls in Port Colborne.
“I sent some of our guys back to the hall to make sure if they (Fort Erie and Wainfleet) had to respond, they knew where they were going.”
The cause of the fire has not been determined and there was no damage figure available.
Bendia said fire prevention officer Scott Lawson was on scene ready to start an investigation and that the Office of the Ontario Fire Marshal was notified and would respond when the fire was out.
Road closures were to continue on Barber Road and Second Concession along with Highway 140 and Second Concession until the scene is cleared by the fire service.