UPDATE: The Rock Island Fire Department was back on the scene Monday putting out hay bales that were still smoldering.
EARLIER UPDATE: Smoke lingers at the site of the Rock Island Cattle Auction after yesterday’s massive fire. Greg Marty, Fire Marshal with the City of Rock Island, gave Our Quad Cities News new details on the blaze.
“Last night at 5:37 p.m., multiple reports started coming in of a fire in the area of Fifth Street and 37th Avenue,” said Marty. “Fire crews arrived within three to four minutes and found heavy fire on the back side of the Rock Island Cattle Auction. Units responded from cities all around the area.”
He explains why a fire of this type is especially dangerous. “This building was filled with lots of square bales of straw, also hundreds and hundreds of round bales of hay. Anybody that lives outside of town that’s ever been around a barn fire knows that there’s really not enough water in a city to put that out. All you can do is try to minimize the smoke, minimize the impact it has on your community, until you can ultimately bring in heavy equipment to tear it apart and then eventually put it out.” The department relied on neighboring departments to bring water. “We also had some water supply issues because this is at the end of a very large main, but we were consuming all the water, so we did utilize rural departments from all across Rock Island County to help us with providing adequate water.”
Complicating matters were the cattle who were at the auction barn at the time of the fire. “On our arrival, at the time of the fire, there were approximately 23 head of cattle that were in the building,” said Marty. “Luckily, we were able to move 22 of them to safety, in safe areas while the fire was burning. Unfortunately, one did perish. There were no civilian injuries, no firefighter injuries.” Crews remained on the scene on Sunday to monitor the situation and keep the smoke down for the neighbors.
Marty had nothing but praise for all the crews who responded to the fire. “It was a very large fire that did span a very large area; this building basically stretched from 34th Avenue to 37th Avenue, and that was the extent of the fire travel. We’re very proud that this fire stayed on this property and did not spread to the surrounding properties, which very easily could have happened. You’ve got a lot of homes in this neighborhood that could have easily been part of that. There was some concern, at least for one home at one point yesterday, and that’s basically the mode you go into when you’re responding to a fire of this nature.”
Fires of this size can force firefighters to make difficult calls, Marty says. “Some buildings, especially a building in a remote area like this, a lot of times (a fire) can get a head start before it’s even noticed and reported. So oftentimes, your action is inaction on the building that’s burning and heavy action on the properties that are still savable around it, which is exactly the decision that our commanders made. It turns out it was the right decision. We were able to save hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars of property around it.
The barn is not salvageable. “Unfortunately, the fire building is gonna be considered a total loss.” The investigation into the cause of the fire continues.
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