Crews spend hours battling fire at Huhtamaki warehouse in Winslow, Maine


WINSLOW, Maine (From news reports) -- Several fire departments quickly responded to a commercial building in Winslow Wednesday morning, May 15, after receiving reports of a working fire.

The Winslow Fire Department responded just after 10am to the Kennebec River Park Development. Upon arrival, no flames were visible but heavy smoke was coming from a warehouse.

According to Winslow's Deputy Fire Chief Michael Murphy, the commercial space is owned by Mardens; however, the building impacted is being leased by Huhtamaki, a food packaging company.

Chief Murphy says the building was filled with stacks of shredded paper that were burning, making it difficult to isolate the source of the fire.

"They are three thousand pound bales and they were stacked about seven high, and once they get wet they get weak and they fall over, so we did a tactical withdrawal because we had bales that were dropping seven feet high down, and the fire was contained to the building of origin and we were not going to risk firefighters lives over paper," said Chief Murphy.

Are your products listed in the Paperitalo Supplier Directory? If not, click here.