By: Erin Smith
US Highway 701 has reopened Monday evening after a fire at Cape Fear Chemical Tiger Products located at 4271 US 701 South between Elizabethtown and Clarkton, according to Bladen County Emergency Management Director Bradley Kinlaw. The road was closed for the better part of the day on Monday.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation. Kinlaw said, “We are going back out to look at it (the building) in the morning.”
The fire at Tiger Products ocurred inside the building as workers were using a machine to process sulfur dust. No injuries were reported and all workers were accounted for.
Damage to the building included a hole in the roof and a gaping hole in one side of the facility. Firefighters and Haz-Mat units worked throughout the day to extinguish the smoldering sulfur.
At one point, residents who resided within one-quarter mile downwind of the plant were evacuated.
Cape Fear Chemical Tiger Products owner Jamie Brice said the company has been located at the site for 66 years with few problems. Brice said that there was a “minor incident” at the plant about three years ago.
Lenwood Howell, an employee at the plant, said, “We didn’t see nothing but fire coming from the machine and everyone trying to get away. It scared us. It could have been much worse than it was.”
Responding to the incident were Elizabethtown Fire Department, Clarkton Fire Department, Bladenboro Fire Department, Lisbon Fire Department, White Lake Fire Department, Bladen County EMS, Bladen County Emergency Management, the North Carolina Highway Patrol, and Bladen County Sheriff’s Office.
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