MALDEN PLANT BURNS

MALDEN -- A fire at a tire recycling plant near Malden that resulted in the evacuation of a square mile in rural Dunklin County may be incorporated into a pending lawsuit by the state against the recycling company.

The fire, which began early Thursday morning inside Heartland Industries west of Malden, is the second fire at the plant in as many years. In January 1997, a fire broke out among 80,000 chipped tires in the yard of the plant.

In all, representatives from about 25 emergency agencies from throughout Southeast Missouri responded to the fire. Mark Winkler, the southeast coordinator of the State Emergency Management Agency, said it was the first time that the statewide mutual-aid agreement has been used on such a grand scale.

No one was injured.

Heartland Industries ceased its recycling process at the plant following last year's fire. But the tires and chemicals used in the recycling process remained in and around the building despite efforts by the Department of Natural Resources to force the owner to clean the site.

Scott Holste, a spokesman for the Missouri attorney general's office, said Thursday the state already has filed a lawsuit against Heartland Industries in the aftermath of last year's fire. In the lawsuit, the state charges Heartland Industries with improper storage and being an unpermitted site.

"The DNR obviously tries to get these tire-site owners to comply with the law, and if they don't then they refer it over for legal action to the attorney general's office, which was done," Holste said.

"Certainly we're going to look at the situation that's happening right now to see if that's going to be incorporated into the state's lawsuit," he said.

Investigators believe that Thursday's fire began in the northwest corner of the building amidst an estimated 75,000 chipped tires that at one time had been slated for recycling. The exact cause of the fire has not been determined.

Just outside the building's northwest corner stood two 30,000-gallon tanks, one containing propane and the other methane. The propane was used as fuel in the recycling process. The methane was a byproduct of recycling. Both are highly explosive.

At one point the fire came within 20 feet of the tanks, exacerbating fears of an explosion.

But firefighters were aided by favorable winds that pushed the fire away from the tanks and from the estimated 200,000 to 300,000 tires stacked outside the building. The fire remained in the north section of the building, allowing emergency personnel to use a bulldozer to separate the tires from the building.

Early in the process, firefighters decided not to try to extinguish the fire but to try to contain it and allow it to burn itself out, said Randy Carter of the Dunklin County Emergency Management Team. Carter estimated it could take two or three days, perhaps up to a week, for the fire to burn out completely.

Rod Hoelscher, an investigator with the state fire marshal's office, said there were three reasons firefighters decided to let the fire burn itself out.

Unknown chemical products in the building made it difficult to know the best way to combat the fire. It was believed the building might contain magnesium, which is used in the recycling process. In a fire, magnesium would burn hot and act as a catalyst for more fire.

If the building contained magnesium, then firefighters could not use water to combat the flames. Magnesium is highly explosive when mixed with water.

Even if it were determined that the building contained no magnesium, firefighters would still allow the fire to burn itself out because there would not be enough water outside the Malden city limits to extinguish the fire, Hoelscher said.

He said that even if there were enough water available, the runoff of the contaminated water would pollute the nearby water systems, requiring a massive environmental cleanup. The DNR estimates that the cleanup from last year's fire at the plant cost upwards of $500,000.

As the fire burned, the roof of the building collapsed on the smoldering chipped tires, holding the heat of the fire in and perhaps prolonging the fire.

Once the fire is extinguished, a team of investigators from the state fire marshal's office will go in and try to determine the cause. "It may be two or three days or up to a week before we can go in," said Hoelscher.

Hoelscher, who may lead the team, refused to speculate about the cause, saying only that it was too early to tell.