Charged batteries shipped to a company that refurbishes electronic equipment “heated up to ignition temperature” and started a fire in the Cadillac Mills complex Thursday, Cumberland Fire Chief Kenneth A. Finlay said. The fire, at Aztek Technologies, 30 Meeting St., Cumberland, was extinguished by the building’s sprinkler system before firefighters arrived, Finlay said.
Firefighters were called to the mill, which has entrances on Meeting Street and Titus Street, at 5:16 p.m. Thursday. They found only smoke, water and a 24- by 36- by 18-inch cardboard box of batteries where the fire apparently started. Some of the company’s product near the box of batteries had been damaged, he said.
Usually the company receives shipments of batteries that haven’t been charged, but the box contained live batteries, which Finlay attributed to a packing error. Employees of the many businesses in the mill complex evacuated when the alarm sounded, including 10 from Texcel Industries, which makes military and camouflage webbing. No one was injured.
The building sustains some water damage because firefighters had trouble turning off the sprinkler system, Finlay said.
Firefighters from the Saylesville fire company in Lincoln assisted with a ladder truck.
Firefighters from the Lower Cape and Mid-Cape areas were tied up for hours after a pile of mattresses caught fire inside a recycling plant Saturday.
Around 1 p.m., rescuers responded to the Daniels Recycling Center building on Giddiah Hill Road after employees at the plant unsuccessfully tried to squelch the nearly ceiling-high pile of mattresses set to be recycled, Orleans Fire Chief Anthony Pike said.
The cause of the two-alarm fire was unknown, Pike added. Firefighters equipped with breathing apparatus entered the warehouse and mostly knocked down the fire, which didn’t appear to damage the building, Pike said.
But because the mattresses and other debris were so compact, workers from the plant took front-end loaders and pulled pile after pile of the debris out of the building to the edge of the plant’s parking lot to be hosed down, Orleans Deputy Chief Geof Deering said.
The Red Cross was on scene with drinks and snacks for the rescuers, and one firefighter was being evaluated for exhaustion, Dennis Deputy Chief Robert Brown said.
The sprinkler system in the warehouse worked to help keep the fire from spreading, Pike said. Fire crews from Dennis, Eastham, Brewster, and Harwich aided Orleans at the scene. Crews from as far as Yarmouth were called in to cover the responding departments’ empty fire stations.
Reporting on lives and property saved by fire sprinklers
