Amish Firewood Business Burns In Early Morning Blaze

A blaze at an Amish firewood business in Parke County, Indiana required intervention by ten separate fire departments to subdue.

Thankfully no one was hurt in the fire, which started in a mechanical room in the wee hours of Tuesday morning. More on the incident via mywabashvalley.com:

MARSHALL, Ind. (WTWO/WAWV)— Ten fire departments responded to a fire in Marshall, Indiana, at a company filled with firewood.

According to the Marshall Volunteer Fire Department’s Fire Chief Kenny Ryan, A fire erupted in the mechanical room at Park County Firewood in the early hours of Tuesday.

Chief Ryan said that the department responded to the fire around 1 a.m., and with the assistance of 9 other departments, was able to get the fire put out by 4:30-5 a.m.

Chief Ryan said that no injuries were reported and that a mechanical error caused the fire.

More on the Amish business, which, it sounds like, was in large part preserved:

Parke County Firewood is an Amish-operated business that cuts, bundles, and sells firewood around the area and can be found in parks, state parks, gas stations, and other regions.

Chief Ryan said the fire destroyed the outdoor drying area that held the company’s kilns.

Chief Ryan did say, however, that the departments were able to keep the flames from the main storage and work areas, as well as the warehouse and offices.

The Amish are no strangers to fires, affecting their barns, homes, and businesses.

Regarding businesses and barns, the presence of machinery, often enough in proximity to flammable material – such as hay, or sawdust in Amish woodworking businesses – provides a potentially potent flammable combo.

So likewise, you’d think that a firewood business would be one prone to these sorts of accidents, particularly in times of dry weather.

I don’t know how dry conditions have been in the area in this case, but it sounds like some sort of machinery was the culprit here. And being a business which stores large quantities of wood intended for burning, it’s not exactly an odd place to have a fire like this.

In this clip from the Marshall Volunteer Fire Department, you can see a brief video of the firefighters directing water onto the blaze:

Good that no one was injured, and bravo to the fire response teams that came together to put the blaze out over several hours while most of the county was asleep. The business was reported to already be in the cleanup process.