No one was injured in the fire, and no employees were working when it started.
Firefighters Monday pour water on the smoldering remains of a fire at Westover Bandag that started Sunday night.CHICOPEE – Firefighters continued to pour water Monday on the smoldering remains of a tire company building which was destroyed in a major fire.
There were no employees in the Westover Bandag building at 920 Sheridan St. when the fire was reported at about 6:30 p.m. Sunday. No one was injured in the blaze, Fire Chief Stephen S. Burkott said.
City firefighters working with the state Fire Marshal’s Office are investigating the cause of the blaze, he said.
“It was a very difficult fire due to the nature of the materials that are burning,” he said. “Tire fires are extremely difficult to extinguish because once the fire gets inside the tire it is difficult to get water onto the fire.”
Bandag attaches new treads mostly to tractor trailer truck tires. It has been located on Sheridan Street for about 15 years, owner Peter Kearing said.
There were thousands of pounds of rubber in the building, but the company uses no solvents or other materials in the production so reports of other substances in the building were incorrect, Kearing said.
It took firefighters nearly five hours to bring the blaze, which spewed clouds of black smoke into the air that could be seen for miles, under control. Westover Air Reserve Fire Department, which has a foam truck designed to extinguish flaming jet fuel, eventually was called to assist, Burkott said.
“It wasn’t until Westover Fire Department arrived and we put foam on the fire we made significant progress,” Burkott said.
Later the building collapsed, creating protected pockets of debris that were still burning, said Fire Capt. David A. Beauregard.
Between seven and 10 people work at Bandag, depending on how busy the company is at the time. It is one of eight subsidiaries of Holyoke Auto and Tire Service Inc. of West Springfield.
Kearing said employees will work at his other businesses, and he has already contacted the parent Bandag company, which is sending equipment so the operation can re-open.
For now, that equipment will be set up in the West Springfield business. Kearing said he was unsure if he would rebuild in Chicopee, where between 88 and 110 tires were reconditioned daily.
Bandag was one of Kearing’s businesses cited in February by the state Department of Environmental Protection for violations mostly related to the handling of waste oil used to heat the facilities. Some of the violations at Bandag included failing to mark a boundary where the waste oil was stored and not providing sufficient training for employees handling oil.
“The violations were fixed. They were very cooperative following the inspections,” Catherine V. Skiba, regional spokeswoman for DEP, said.
The companies were fined a total of $30,000 for what Kearing called mostly record-keeping failures. Each held permits from local fire departments to heat with the waste oil.
None of violations could have caused the fire, he and Skiba agreed.