December 30, 2003

Fire destroys office; metal shop spared

       A fire that gutted the offices of a Greenwood steel-fabricating plant will pause production only temporarily. The co-owner hopes the company will be up and running again within days.  “None of our people are going to miss work. They’re not going to be laid off or anything,” co-owner Gary Pugh said outside Sanjo Steel.  Fire charred the second and third stories of the limestone office portion of the plant at 610 W. Main St. But the corrugated metal portion of the building, the manufacturing shop, was largely untouched. Pugh said the company may bring in temporary office trailers while repairs are under way. All of Sanjo’s approximately 20 employees were told to report to work today.  Sanjo Steel makes fabricated steel parts, such as beams, staircases, structural supports and catwalks, for building construction.  Greenwood firefighters still hadn’t found the cause of the blaze as of Monday afternoon, but it started in and was confined to the L-shaped building’s office area. The plant had been closed for the long Christmas holiday weekend since Wednesday, Greenwood Fire Lt. Tom Kite said.  A preliminary damage estimate for the office portion was $200,000 to $250,000. The plant is insured.  A passerby saw smoke billowing from the windows of Sanjo Steel and called 911 at 6:32 a.m.  A total of 53 firefighters on 10 trucks — from Greenwood, White River Township, Perry Township and New Whiteland — battled the flames for about two hours.  “We sent three crews in to fight an interior fire,” Greenwood Fire Chief Steve Dhondt said. “After about 20 minutes, they weren’t making much headway, so we pulled them out and used aerial ladders (to shoot water) through the windows and through the roof, and put the majority of the fire out.  “After about a half an hour of that, we were able to send crews back inside to do mop-up work and put the fire out.”  Paint and thinner were stored inside the plant, so a representative from the Indiana Department of Environmental Management was on hand to monitor water quality from the runoff. But the fire did not extend to the plant’s production area.  Nearby homes and businesses were not evacuated.  Once the fire was under control, firefighters cut more holes along the peak of the roof to look for hot spots in the insulation.  “The type of insulation in that roof, it burns like incense would. If you don’t get it all, (fire) slithers its way through there until it can find a place that’s not so dense, and then it can get oxygen and burn,” Kite said.  But tearing an opening in the roof also exposed the factory floor to water damage and rain. Firefighters brought in tarps to cover the expensive metal-cutting equipment.  Firefighters also were able to salvage records from the office, including file cabinets and smoke-stained blueprints of building components Sanjo was to assemble for clients. Sanjo workers took shelter from the drenching cold rain in a sign shop next door and sorted through their salvaged records.  Since the business’ accounting and other records were backed up on computer disk through Dec. 22, nearly everything was saved, Dhondt said.  The building was constructed in the 1950s and formerly housed another company, Demco, Kite said.  Privately owned and operated, Sanjo Steel was founded in 1979 and has occupied the building since then. The Greenwood plant is the company’s only location.  Pugh assured Sanjo’s clients that the company will be able to fill its orders.  “We’ve got contracts to fulfill, and we’re going to do that,” he said.  Employees arrived at work Monday morning only to find fire trucks surrounding their workplace.  “Everybody showed up; we sent them home and told them to be here at 7 o’clock in the morning (today),” Pugh said. Other than a New Whiteland firefighter, Craig Giddings, who turned his ankle, no one else was injured in the blaze.  “Nobody got hurt, that’s the most important part,” Pugh said of employees. “Nobody’s going to lose their job.”  (Reprinted with permission from the Daily Journal)
 

           
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