Winston-Salem urges residents near blazing fertilizer plant to evacuate due to possible explosion
Officials have urged nearly 6,500 residents in 2,500 homes in North Carolina to evacuate after an uncontrolled fire at a fertilizer plant in Winston-Salem began burning Monday night, officials said. Firefighters warn that chemicals at the site could cause a large explosion.
At about 6:30 p.m. local time, the Winston Weaver Company Fertilizer plant caught fire in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. No injuries have been reported, officials said Tuesday afternoon. According to the city's fire chief William "Trey" Mayo, there were nearly 600 tons of ammonium nitrate and 5,000 tons of finished fertilizer at the facility.
Strike teams, air quality monitoring devices and drones have been deployed to monitor the fire and the environment, Mayo said at a Tuesday morning press conference. He added that "things have been relatively static for the last eight hours."
Captain Matthew Smith of North Carolina's Hazardous Material Regional Response said firefighters are playing a "waiting game" to see how the burning facility's chemicals will react. He said crews will stay out of the blaze's danger zone for at least 36 hours while the fire burns and continues to lose fuel.
"It's not worth having firefighters go in and try to put the fire out," Smith said Tuesday. "It's at a happy state right now and we don't want to do anything to change that."
Winds have been moving smoke from the fire southwestward and residents with breathing problems are encouraged to stay indoors, according to the Winston-Salem Fire Department.
Chief Mayo said Tuesday that air quality tests outside of the fire's one-mile radius fire zone have found no "immediate dangers to life and health," But according to IQAir, an international air quality technology company, Winston-Salem as of Tuesday afternoon exceeded the World Health Organization's annual air quality guideline value for the concentration of PM2.5 particles.
"The more compromised your respiratory system is, then the more risk you are taking by being outside and breathing the products of combustion," Mayo said.
Wake Forest University, which is situated near the fire's evacuation zone, canceled classes Tuesday and urged students living in dorms to stay indoors and to keep windows closed.
A shelter has been established at the Winston-Salem Fairgrounds, and evacuated residents are told by the fire department to plan to be away from their homes for at least 48 hours.
Mayo said it's too early to initiate an investigation into the fire's cause origins and that it is still unclear as to how it ignited.
"We are not anywhere near that point in the event," he said.
