A fire at Dinoflex burned a few rubber mats but little else, thanks to heat detectors and smoke alarms.
“They had made some Friday morning and finished around noon,” says Salmon Arm Fire Chief Brad Shirley. “Because of the process and heat involved, they do have a tendency to heat up. It is suspected it was spontaneous combustion of the pile of mats inside the building.”
Firehall No, 2 on South Broadview responded to the commercial fire alarm at 3:36 a.m. Sunday, Aug. 10.
When firefighters saw smoke on their arrival at the business, located at 5590 46 Ave. SE, the call was upgraded to a commercial structure fire, says Shirley.
This brought out additional resources from halls 1 and 3, with a total of some 30 firefighters responding to the fire.
While firefighters from three halls attended the fire scene, a crew from Hall 4 in Gleneden was staged at Hall 2 in order to be able to respond quickly in the event of another fire in the city.
“Crews gained access and quickly knocked down the fire, and damage was limited to a small area of origin,” said Shirley, noting firefighters were on scene for four hours. “We credit the fire alarm system for early detection and the quick response/attack from the firefighters for a great save.”
Shirley said that because of the company’s more secluded location in the industrial park, it might not have been seen until flame was visible on the outside.
Dinoflex CEO Mark Bunz says minimal water and truss damage occurred.
“Other than that, we were very fortunate and the fire department got in and everything worked as well as the smoke detectors,” he said Monday morning, pointing out he expected production to resume in the afternoon. “This is really a situation that has not occurred in the past and doesn’t normally occur. Based on an internal investigation, we will begin a cooling process and store outdoors to prevent this from happening in the future.”
