{"id":3810,"date":"2024-07-13T22:44:23","date_gmt":"2024-07-13T22:44:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/firefighters-tackle-large-fire-at-industrial-estate\/"},"modified":"2024-07-13T22:44:23","modified_gmt":"2024-07-13T22:44:23","slug":"firefighters-tackle-large-fire-at-industrial-estate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/firefighters-tackle-large-fire-at-industrial-estate\/","title":{"rendered":"Firefighters tackle large fire at industrial estate"},"content":{"rendered":"


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A tractor and slurry tank can be seen assisting firefighters in tackling the blaze at the Greenbank industrial estate<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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A senior fire commander has thanked local farmers in the Newry area who assisted fire officers with a major blaze near the city centre.<\/p>\n

At one stage, 50 firefighters were dealing with the incident in the Greenbank industrial estate. <\/p>\n

The alarm was raised at 11:47 BST on Saturday after it is believed the fire broke out in a kart racing centre and spread to two other units.<\/p>\n

Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service (NIFRS) Group Commander, Paul Gould, thanked local farmers who had brought their slurry tanks. <\/p>\n

“I can’t commend them enough,” he said. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Paul Gould from the fire service thanked local farmers <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

‘Dangerous conditions’<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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“The use of their agricultural vehicles and their help and assistance has been so valuable.<\/p>\n

“They’ve been assisting us with their machinery and were able to feed us water, initially, when we didn’t have enough resources here and they’re still assisting us.<\/p>\n

“So, I honestly want to thank each and every one of them.” <\/p>\n

Mr Gould said officers had been working in “dangerous conditions” as the fire was “well-developed” when crews arrived.<\/p>\n

He added that the blaze had been “very complicated to deal with” due to the “layout and construction of the building”.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Black plumes of smoke could be seen from miles around the scene of the fire<\/figcaption><\/p>\n
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The fire spread to two other units, including a furniture showroom. <\/p>\n

The owners of the furniture shop, House of Murphy, a 50-year-old business said their shop had been destroyed. <\/a><\/p>\n

Selina Murphy told BBC News NI the shop employs 11 people.<\/p>\n

“We are in this premises 27 years but this year we were celebrating 50 years in business as the House of Murphy,” she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Business-owner Selina Murphy said it was a shocking scene<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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“It’s shocking to see what has happened. <\/p>\n

“The fire service has been unreal – they were on site quickly and attended rapidly,” she added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Selina Murphy said firefighters had arrived on the scene quickly<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n

At the scene: Darran Marshall, BBC News NI <\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
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The fire is close to P\u00e1irc Esler GAA stadium and various business premises<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Earlier, loud popping noises could be heard in the city and large plumes of black smoke were seen from more than 10 miles away.<\/p>\n

The fire moved from the back, towards the front of the building, and part of it collapsed.<\/p>\n

Flames could be seen leaping over the roof and a large cordon was put in place.<\/p>\n

A convoy of tractors with slurry tanks full of water spent the day dousing down the flames.<\/p>\n

The heat of the fire was, at one stage, so intense it could be felt from where I was standing, outside Down GAA\u2019s P\u00e1irc Esler.<\/p>\n

Earlier, the fire service and police were concerned about the fire spreading to adjacent premises.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Thick black smoke engulfed the area <\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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The operation to extinguish the blaze is ongoing and, while the NIFRS said resources have scaled down, fire crews are expected to remain at the scene overnight.<\/p>\n

Earlier Mr Gould said a “large number of resources” had been deployed to tackle the blaze – six pump appliances, two aerial appliances and one control unit.<\/p>\n

Fire officers from Newry, Warrenpoint and Belfast are involved in the operation.<\/p>\n

The NIFRS has advised residents to “keep all windows and doors closed in the local area”.<\/p>\n

The roads around the estate had been closed to traffic earlier but have since reopened. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Greenbank industrial estate is located next to the Warrenpoint dual carriageway<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Earlier Karen McKevitt, a former SDLP assembly member, told BBC News NI, from the scene, it looked like the flames were “spreading quite quickly”.<\/p>\n

“It’s bellowing out quite a lot of black, thick smoke and I have been speaking to a few local businesses down in Greenbank who have evacuated their premises as a precautionary [measure] with their windows closed,” she said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Part of the front of the building appears to have collapsed in<\/figcaption><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n
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Ms McKevitt added her thoughts were with the affected businesses based in the industrial estate and the emergency services who were trying to protect them. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n


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BBC A tractor and slurry tank can be seen assisting firefighters in tackling the blaze at the Greenbank industrial estate A senior fire commander has thanked local farmers in the Newry area who assisted fire officers with a major blaze near the city centre. At one stage, 50 firefighters were dealing with the incident in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3811,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[276,666,2806,2808,1077,2807],"class_list":["post-3810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-n-ireland","tag-estate","tag-fire","tag-firefighters","tag-industrial","tag-large","tag-tackle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3810"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3812,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810\/revisions\/3812"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}