MILLEDGEVILLE – A fire that broke out around 2 p.m. Thursday at the Milledgeville Farmers Elevator turned into a weekend project.
Apparently, about 475,000 bushels of corn, which had been stored in the elevator for 4 to 7 years, had been smoldering for months before the grain finally overheated, Tom Korte said Monday evening.
Korte is the technical rescue coordinator for the Mutual Aid Box Alarm System Division 17, in Stephenson County. His Tactical Rescue Team helped keep an eye on firefighters and other emergency workers as they emptied the bin and quelled the fire, as did the Ogle County TRT.
There were no injuries.
Residents caught wind of the bin fire days before – they could smell the smolder "for quite a while" before actually seeing smoke, Korte said.
The Millegdeville Fire Department made a special nozzle to try to put out the fire from outside. In the end, though, they had to cut a hole in the bottom of the bin, reinforce the opening, shovel out the hot grain with end loaders, dump it into tractor-trailers and haul it away.
The Ogle County TRT was on scene from about 1 to 9 p.m. Saturday, then Korte's team stood by from about 9:30 p.m. until 3 or 4 p.m. Sunday, he said.
The TRTs were on hand as a safety measure, per Occupational Safety and Health Administration requirements; the bin was considered to be a "permit-required confined space" because of its limited accessibility, Korte said.
While there, "we monitored the atmosphere and did some ventilation work," he said.
By Sunday afternoon, most of the grain had been removed and there were three entrances cleared in the bin, so the TRT no longer was required.
Milledgeville firefighters cleared the scene about 3:30 a.m. Monday.
A call late Monday to Milledgeville Fire Chief David Folk was not returned, and there was no answer at the fire department or at the elevator on North Cochran Avenue.