Five departments, including Holyoke, respond to Nutrien fire

Smoke billowed and could be seen for miles last week as a chemical fire burned at the Nutrien Ag Solutions facility along Highway 6 in Lamar.

The Jan. 11 fire drew nearly 50 firefighters from Lamar, Imperial and three other departments. The Imperial Volunteer Fire Department was paged at 1 p.m.

Doug Mitchell, IVFD chief, said the Nebraska State Fire Marshal’s Office has determined the cause to be accidental and undetermined, “and it will likely stay that way.”

That’s because the section of building in which the fire started eventually collapsed on top of chemicals inside.

Firefighters used limited water on the burning areas to avoid hazardous runoff, he said.

“We knew when we set up that water, use would be limited. No one could enter the building because it collapsed with chemicals inside,” he said.

A big focus of the firefighting was the area in between the buildings to the east—which include a shop/work area where it started, more storage area and offices — and a larger storage building on the west, which housed more chemicals, many of them in large drums, Mitchell said.

The buildings are connected with a breezeway. Most of the water was used between the buildings and the breezeway to keep the building to the west cool, he said.  

That breezeway is now crumpled from the fire and heat.   It helped immensely, the fire chief said, that the west building with more chemicals was protected with a large fire door, “which did its job.”

The heat did damage the large storage building to the west. Blackened residue can be seen on both its east and south sides. Mitchell said insulation and its interior also sustained some damage.

Fire did get through and burned a small area of the large storage building, which was put out with fire extinguishers, Mitchell said.

Later into the evening, as the fire spread eastward into the office area, Mitchell said they had to basically let it burn because of the directive to use limited water.

“It was a bit overwhelming because we couldn’t put it out. The important thing was no one was hurt,” he added.

For several hours during the fire, Highway 6 was closed from the Nutrien location west to the Colorado state line due to visibility issues. 

Mitchell said the fire was still active when most of the firefighters left the scene around 8 p.m.

Using Imperial and Lamar firefighters and officers, a series of watch shifts was set up throughout the night and into Thursday until about 4 p.m., Mitchell noted.

He and another officer returned Saturday to continue assessing the scene.

During the response, four porta-tanks were set up at the site. The IVFD reached out specifically to the Holyoke, Colorado department, requesting its pumper, while the Grant  fire department supplied its air cascade system that has high-pressure breathing air used for refilling breathing apparatus cylinders.

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