News

Australian milk factory fire

AUSTRALIA

An explosion and fire that tore through a Longwarry milk production plant in the early hours of the morning is believed to have caused more than $3 million in damage.

The explosion occurred at 1.20am in the milk drying plant at Longwarry Food Park, The Mackey St factory processes both wet and dry milk, and the fire started in a machine that turns liquid milk into powder form.

CFA spokeswoman Kayla Maskell said the machine is very hot inside and continued that, “Sometimes it doesn’t completely dry and it sticks to the wall, it can build up and is really combustible,” she said.

There was an explosion in the machine, which caused a spark and the fire spread to other equipment along the production line.

Warragul CFA operations officer Ian Pattie said it took two hours to bring the fire under control and a further two hours to cool the plant down before they could leave.

“The fire virtually destroyed the milk drying plant, but we stopped it before it spread any further,’’ he said.

Mr Pattie said explosions at dry production plants were not uncommon, due to the heat needed to convert milk into powder.

Management expect dry production at the plant, which largely covers their export market, to be down for several weeks but fresh milk production is expected to return to normal by the end of the day.

“Luckily when firefighters got there they were able to separate the equipment and contain it to that particular area in the drying chamber,” Ms Maskell said.

Seven CFA crews took until 4.50am to put out the blaze, and didn’t leave the scene until about 7am.

There were four staff working at the time, but none in that part of the factory meaning no one was hurt in the fire.