Black smoke billowed from the factory, prompting warnings for surrounding areas. Pictures: KEITH PAKENHAM – CFA
By CASEY NEILL
Factory blaze threatens parts supply to automotive industry
A KEYSBOROUGH factory fire has caused $750,000 damage and sent shockwaves through the state’s automotive industry.
Greater Dandenong CIU Detective Senior Constable Tim Sullivan said an electrical fault in a dipping tank sparked the blaze at Venture DMG in Kirkham Road West just before 6am on 19 October.
He said five workers were on site at the time but they were evacuated uninjured.
CFA crews from Dandenong, Springvale, Keysborough, Frankston, Patterson River and Hallam contained the fire to less than half of the building and deemed it under control about 7.20am.
Operations officer Peter Lucas said the firefighters did a fantastic job to contain the fire to the chrome plating and moulding factory, which is within a large industrial complex.
He said chemicals were involved so the CFA’s scientific officer and Environment Protection Authority (EPA) were also on scene. There were smoke warnings for Dandenong South around Cheltenham Road near EastLink.
But the fire’s impact is wide-reaching and will continue for several weeks.
Finance director Michael Cain said: “It will affect part of our operation for approximately four weeks and we are working hard to ensure that the flow-on impact is minimised.”
“The damaged equipment includes some specialised equipment and the necessary experts have been called to assist with the reinstatement as quickly as possible.”
Venture DMG supplies grilles, badges and other ornaments for Toyota, Holden and Ford.
Toyota spokesman Glenn Campbell said it was a major component supplier to the vehicle manufacturer, which makes the Camry, Hybrid Camry and Aurion cars at its Altona plant.
Mr Campbell said that on Monday Toyota brought forward a plant day off scheduled for Friday to work out how to handle the situation.
He said the plant had enough stock left for the rest of the week, but the shortfall would then affect about 60 per cent of cars.
“But we will continue to build cars as per our schedule,” he said.
Mr Campbell said vehicles with chrome parts would still be built, and the chrome parts would be added when they were available.
He said Toyota was sourcing them from other suppliers in Australia and overseas but would “continue to assess the situation on a daily basis”.
