Factory fires

By Melissa Meehan
LOCAL fire fighters have been kept busy over the past week attending three factory fires.
Dandenong and Springvale CFA volunteers fought a blaze at a timber factory in McWilliams Street, Springvale, on Thursday for eight hours with the help of the Noble Park CFA and Metropolitan Fire Brigade.
Springvale CFA fire officer Bernie Frawley said it was good work from the brigades to extinguish the fire in the unstable building.
On their way back to the station, the brigades received another call to a fire at the old Ingham’s Chicken Factory in Spring Street, Dingley.
Mr Frawley said the fire started in an unused cool store area which was “completely gutted by the blaze”.
He said both fires were investigated and they were awaiting report.
On Wednesday night Dandenong CFA members were called to a fire at the Bluescope Steel factory in Hastings not long after midnight. Two crews were sent to the site including a platform appliance and a HAZMAT specialist crew.
Leading fire fighter Alec Draffin said the platform appliance helped to stop the spread of the fire to the eastern end of the building.
“Another crew went down with HAZMAT specialist monitoring equipment,” he said.
“They monitored smoke, plumes, and water run off.”
Crews were there until 8am, but the site was monitored for a number of days following the blaze.