CORINTH – A fire Tuesday at Corinth Wood Pellets Manufacturing LLC has caused an estimated $500,000 in damage and shut the company down for an unknown period of time.

“I see them being several days out of work,” Corinth Fire Chief Scott Bragdon said Tuesday.

When it opened in March 2007, the company, owned by Ken Eldridge, was touted as the largest of its kind in the United States and was set to produce an estimated 140,000 tons of wood pellets per year for sale both domestically and overseas. It initially employed about a dozen workers but anticipated having 40 producing 300,000 tons of pellets by the end of the year.

The fire at the facility Tuesday was called in shortly before 11 a.m. as a fire on the roof, but when firefighters arrived, Bragdon said the roof and attic were on fire, and one outside wall was engulfed in flames.

The blaze started when a fire in one of the exterior burners was sucked inside the building by a fan.

Dust and insulation inside ignited, and the fire was tough to fight, Bragdon said.

“It was a real stubborn fire because everything’s dusty in there,” he said. “We had to really do a lot of overhaul, digging it out of the walls and out of the ceiling.”

Fire crews from Bradford, Charleston, Glenburn, Dover-Foxcroft and Levant were called in to assist Corinth. Dexter Fire stood by at the Corinth station with additional trucks in case they were needed.

“We needed a couple of extra ladder trucks to gain access because everything was above the roofline,” Bragdon said. “The metal roof made it tricky.”

Crews from Corinth were expected to operate a 24-hour detail at the facility to watch for potential flare-ups.

“The insurance company is there now,” Bragdon said. “They’re trying to get stuff repaired to get the production line back going.”

Although no one was injured, there was excessive heat, smoke and water damage to the building, the fire chief said. A team of electricians and contractors also had been called to the site to assess the damage.

About a foot of blown insulation in the attic and dust had to be rolled over and wet down to make sure the flames were out.

An employee asked photographers to leave the property, and reporters’ phone calls seeking information weren’t returned Tuesday evening.

The pellets made by the company are used in stoves that look similar to wood stoves but have a more sophisticated combustion chamber. Pellet stoves, like wood stoves, have enjoyed increased sales because of heating oil prices that have pushed homeowners to seek alternative heating sources.

The production plant is housed in the former Corinth Products Co. Inc., which closed in August 2006, leaving 21 people without work.

At the time the wood pellet company opened in March 2007, the second phase of the project was expected to be completed by the end of the year. Additional lines were anticipated to allow the company to produce more than 300,000 tons of pellets a year and create 40 jobs at the site.

In addition to those 40 jobs at the factory, an additional 120 jobs were expected to be created for loggers, truck drivers and others.

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