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Comment by Cory on November 1, 2008 at 4:10pm

It happened June 14 2007 at 10:30 p.m and ended at the 17th at noon (and after we got back and had put 1 engine together we got a residential structure fire, then we had 2 more structure fires that week so we were really busy that week) when we went back in service after the VIM fire. The place is a recycling center that takes in wood from all over the RV industry. Basically they had some inexperienced people in there I guess and the plant itself which I need to find a picture of that, but the plant was full of sawdust in the air and it exploded and due to a machine causing a spark, and it blew a fireball 100Ft. out of the building and started the big pile of scrap wood on fire which the piles are about as tall and in some spots taller than the building. When I went on scene the East West building was engulfed with fire and the North South building did have fire in it but not like the east west portion. The pile basically is I don't know probably at least a football field wide by at least a football field long. I was command for the first 14 hours of the fire I live only a mile down the road when it blew up, but at the time I was Assistant Chief of the Dept. But the location of the fire is in Elkhart, IN in Baugo Township, during the duration of the fire we had over 50 fire dept show up at which some just saw it on the news and came here to help shuttle water and with man power It was pretty amazing, the staffing topped 500 people showed up during the call. And thankfully as much as we don't like this place there is a hydrant out in front of the place and they have some inside the complex but of course those are covered, and the streets that go around the building there is hydrants (south side is a small 2 lane highway, east is a business complex, north is a residential road, and so is the west side road. But we have a river with a few boat landings we were able to access, which was nice when the Emergency Management came and told me in the command vehicle that the City of Elkhart only had 3 hours of water left in the entire city, LOL talk about saying O crap for lack of better words. But the guys got an awesome water shuttle set up and we never lost water during the whole operation. To me it is that type of fire where everybody did their job and everything got done, nobody complained but then again when, Texas Roadhouse, McDonalds, Tack Bell, and bunch of other places kick in a bunch of food for the guys I guess what else can you ask for, you have fire and food a good combination. I really wish I had a picture that I could show of all the water that was flowing, I would say we had Elkhart’s City, (Elkhart Township come in later), and Osolo's Tower ladders there, we had Cleveland and Wakarusa’s Sticks there then probably about 10 maybe a few less ground monitors going. So there was a tremendous amount of water flowing and not losing water was awesome. But the water wasn’t what put out the fire it, we had to have bulldozers come in and push dirt up on the huge mound that was on fire so that sucked because to let it burn it would probably burn for a long, long time, but don’t get me wrong it still is burning under the dirt and crap still pops up every once in a while but the company comes in and covers it back up. But we had a fire like this a few years ago but not to this magnitude. But when my neighbor knocked on my door and told me to look and I saw the ski was lit up in fire I could see some flames cause some stuff was blowing up early in the fire, I thought holy crap! I knew I had heard something but didn’t think anything of it we had gotten the kids to bed late that night for some reason. But it was a good fire, but I hope to never have to go back there again because all it really is is a big ass camp fire!

Comment by Beben on November 1, 2008 at 11:23am

great picture, when that was happened and where?