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<title>Up in flames | News | The Register-Guard | Eugene, Oregon</title>
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<h6><a href="http://registerguard.com">The Register-Guard</a></h6>
<p><a href="#one">Fire</a> / <a href="#two">Community</a> / <a href="#three">Questions</a> / <a href="#related">Related</a></p>
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<h1>UP IN FLAMES</h1>
<p>On July 17, 2014 the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill burned to the ground leaving about 250 people out of work and a community reeling. Here is the story of that day and those that followed.</p>
<div style="width:100%">
<h2>
<a href="#one">The fire</a> | <a href="#two">The community</a> | <a href="#three">Lingering questions</a>
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<h1>UP IN FLAMES</h1>
<p>On July 17, 2014 the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill burned to the ground leaving about 250 people out of work and a community reeling. Here is the story of that day and those that followed.</p>
<div style="width:100%">
<h2>
<a href="#one">The fire</a><br><a href="#two">The community</a><br><a href="#three">Lingering questions</a>
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Eugene/Springfield firefighter Andy Fidino sprays water on veneer at the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill on Thursday, July 17, 2014. The plant burned to the ground. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<h1>Fire destroys mill, idles 250 workers</h1>
<h2>A neighborhood is evacuated briefly as the fast-moving blaze consumes Springfield Plywood and Veneer</h2>
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<div class="pure-u-1 pure-u-md-1-2 bat_byline">
By <a href="mailto:christian.hill@registerguard.com">Christian Hill</a> & <a href="ian.campbell@registerguard.com">Ian Campbell</a><span id="bat_byline_break"> | </span>The Register-Guard
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July 18, 2014
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<p class="bat_first">About 250 employees face an uncertain future after a spectacular fire, which started in a dryer and caused numerous explosions, quickly destroyed the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill Thursday afternoon.</p>
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Springfield Utility Board workers check out flames at the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill on Thursday, July 17, 2014. The SUB plant is adjacent to the plant. The plant burned to the ground. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>About 100 firefighters from seven agencies were dispatched to fight the fire, which prompted officials to briefly declare an evacuation within a one-mile radius of the plant at 1651 South F St.</p>
<p>The evacuation notice was rescinded about 7 p.m. Firefighters continued their watch overnight.</p>
<p>The blaze, which was reported shortly after 4:30 p.m., sent an ominous plume of black smoke high into the hot summer air that area residents could see for miles. Dozens of people lined South A Street to capture the first hour of the fiery scene on their smartphones and cameras as traffic on the thoroughfare slowed to a crawl. Police officers temporarily blocked side streets near the mill.</p>
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(Alan Sylvestre/The Register-Guard)
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<p>Employees at the scene when the fire broke out said they raced to safety as the fast-moving fire began consuming the mill within minutes. No injuries of employees or firefighters were reported. More than 100 people were believed to be working at the mill at the time the fire started,</p>
<p>Dewayne Hunter, 40, a forklift driver at the mill, said he was in the finish yard when a large dryer, used to dry wet veneer, caught fire and then ignited debris in the air.</p>
<p>“The fire was, like, right there in my face,” he said.</p>
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Twenty-year employee Melody Fairbanks watches from a distance as plume of smoke rises over the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>It was difficult for Hunter and other employees not to speculate about what the fire means for them and their families.</p>
<p>“All the buildings are down, and it’s still burning,” said Melody Fairbanks, who has worked at the mill for 20 years, shortly after getting out of the plant. “This is the worst possible thing that could happen to me.”</p>
<p>Firefighters were hampered by the absence of any fire hydrants south of railroad tracks next to the mill, Eugene Springfield Fire Chief Randy Groves said.</p>
<p>Firefighters relied on water tenders and a Weyer­haeuser water-dumping helicopter called in by the state Department of Forestry to help battle the flames.</p>
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A helicopter drops water on the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill in Springfield on Thursday, July 17, 2014, in an effort to douse flames after the plant erupted in flames. The plant burned to the ground. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>The fire spread to two other buildings in the mill complex but those were quickly stamped out, Groves said.</p>
<p>A number of spot fires ignited in wildlands to the south of the mill. Firefighters were on the scene with a water line in case any hot spots reignited.</p>
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(Alan Sylvestre/The Register-Guard)
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<p>“I’m hoping we have a handle on this now,” Groves said about 8 p.m., “but we’re not going anywhere any time soon.”</p>
<p>Groves said ready water would not have saved the mill, but might have prevented the fire from spreading into the wildlands.</p>
<p>Firefighters were aided by a lack of strong winds that Groves said could have spread the fire farther and kept the smoke closer to the ground.</p>
<p>The cause of the fire officially remains under investigation. Groves said it could be days before investigators can determine the cause. No damage loss figure was available immediately.</p>
<p>Groves said boilers and propane tanks exploded in the fire. Some workers at the scene said they believe that glue tanks also may have exploded. Glues are used in making plywood and veneers.</p>
<p>Groves praised the company and its employees for their orderly evacuation. “They were well organized,” he said.</p>
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Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill workers get on a LTD bus at 16th and A St. that arrived to transport them back to their vehicles. (Alisha Jucevic/The Register-Guard)
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<p>The 33-acre mill is owned by privately held Swanson Group Mfg. LLC, based in Glendale. It is one of the family-owned business’ four wood products mills in Oregon.</p>
<p>The complex consisted of about 200,000 square feet of buildings.</p>
<p>The mill sits to the south of a rail line, which was closed temporarily Thursday. Immediately north of the line is the city of Springfield’s public works maintenance headquarters. Immediately to the south of the mill is the Knife River gravel mine.</p>
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People watch the fire from a parking lot off of 15th St. near the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill on Thursday, July 17, 2014. (Alisha Jucevic/The Register-Guard)
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<p>Among the onlookers on South A Street was Cliff Moore, 56, of Springfield, who said he was driving down Main Street when he first saw the smoke from around 28th Street. He said that in a town the size of Springfield, most everyone knows someone who works at the mill.</p>
<p>“You don’t see this every day, and it’s hard to believe you’re seeing it,” he said with his camera aimed at the fiery scene.</p>
<p>Employees were left in a state of disbelief. About 6 p.m., some employees boarded a Lane Transit District bus that ferried them back to the mill’s parking lot so that they could drive their vehicles home.</p>
<p>“Obviously, we’re not going to have a job to come back to on Monday,” Hunter said.</p>
<p><i>Senior Editor Christian Wihtol contributed to this report.</i></p>
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Destroyed vehicles at the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill in Springfield on Thursday, July 17, 2014. While many vehicles were destroyed, firefighters were also able to get other vehicles out without significant damage. The plant burned to the ground. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<h1>Community comes to grips</h1>
<h2>Workers: Flames leave most employees disbelieving and jobless</h2>
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By <a href="mailto:elon.glucklich@registerguard.com">Elon Glucklich</a> & <a href="mailto:christian.hill@registerguard.com">Christian Hill</a> | The Register-Guard
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<div class="pure-u-1 pure-u-md-1-2 bat_date">
July 19, 2014
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<p class="bat_first">Christian Montes remembers the smell of something burning. Then he saw a huge plume of black smoke billow up to the second floor of the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill, where he and dozens of others were at work Thursday afternoon.</p>
<p>Hundreds of lives would change in the minutes to come.</p>
<p>“I saw the roof light up. Everyone was already in a panic to try to get out,” Montes said Friday morning, as he huddled with other workers in a gravel parking lot just yards away from the mill’s charred remains. “All I remember is coming outside and watching the whole thing burn down.”</p>
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Employees of the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon gathered in the plant parking lot to view the devastation on Friday July 18, 2014. About 250 workers are affected by mill's destruction. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>None of the roughly 250 employees were hurt in the fire that ripped through the Springfield plant. But the mood outside on Friday was a mixture of disbelief and resignation that their next paychecks had vanished along with the mill.</p>
<p>“Half the people have been working there for 10-plus years,” said David Buenroustro, who worked at Springfield Plywood and Venner about two years. “They dedicated their lives to that building.”</p>
<p>Workers from their early-20s to mid-60s said it was still too soon to know what they would do. Some who gathered in the mill’s parking lot said they would try to find work at other mills run by the Swanson Group, in Roseburg, about 80 miles south on Interstate 5, or Glendale, 140 miles south.</p>
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Bob Sirotek, left, Mike Sirotek, center with his dog Small Block, and Bill Cushman, right, talk about the loss of the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon, and the future of the jobs on Friday July 18, 2014 in the plants parking lot. Workers gathered to offer support to each other in the wake of the devastating fire. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>Others wanted to stay closer to home.</p>
<p>“I was 14 days away from retiring,” said Bill Cushman, a 61-year-old utility worker in the mill who’s worked there since 2002.</p>
<p>“Everyone makes right around $3,000 to $4,000 a month,” he said. “Now you’re going to take that out of the local economy. That’s going to hurt.”</p>
<p>The mill’s employees typically earned about $15 an hour, plus benefits, workers said, and they were raking in the overtime as demand for plywood increased in the last couple of years.</p>
<p>“This is the morning after,” plant manager Mike Martin said. “We don’t have a lot of answers. We’re just trying to sort things out.”</p>
<p>“Obviously, folks are in shock,” he added. “Our main concern is taking care of our folks and getting them some answers.”</p>
<p>Martin and several employees set up tents, chairs and snacks in the large gravel lot in front of the mill at 161 South F Street to comfort the arriving employees.</p>
<p>There were hugs. There were stories. There was silence as they contemplated a shaky future.</p>
<p>Many will likely file for unemployment insurance while seeking other work.</p>
<p>Francisco Mascote, 63, left work at 3:30 p.m. Thursday, an hour before the fire erupted. A press operator for 17 years, he could see the cloud of smoke from his home. He’s not sure what will come next.</p>
<p>“I’ll just look for another job,” Mascote said.</p>
<p>The workers are eligible for unemployment insurance through the state. Checks are typically sent out weekly, and are based on an employee’s average wage over the last five fiscal quarters, Worksource Lane Assistant Manager Julie Davidson said.</p>
<p>“We are currently in contact with the employer to discuss any and all services that they would like for us to provide,” she said. “We have offered multiple options,” including meeting with workers face-to-face.</p>
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Gene Henderson, stands with his daughter, Lori Sparks, as the look at the devastated Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon, on Friday July 18, 2014. Henderson had worked at the plant for two years. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>Davidson said several mill workers had already come to the Worksource Lane office by then.</p>
<p>Employees said company officials planned to meet with them Monday afternoon.</p>
<p>Friday morning, a slow stream of cars trickled past security guards into the gravel parking lot at the burned veneer mill. Some workers were getting rides to pick up their vehicles, which they’d been forced to leave behind as workers were rapidly evacuated Thursday.</p>
<p>“All my tools are in there,” said Daniel Grimes, a two-year employee at the mill, as he pointed toward the smoking wreckage. “I had two tool kits. My laptop was in there. I lost thousands.”</p>
<p>For Gene Henderson, Thursday’s fire was like a sickening case of deja vu. He’d come to Springfield Plywood and Veneer in 2012, after the Corvallis mill he worked for also burned down.</p>
<p>Holding the hand of his 9-year-old daughter, Lori, Henderson could barely believe the tangled mass of wood and steel in front of him.</p>
<p>“The most important thing is everyone is safe,” he said. “But this is devastating.” Still, Henderson managed to stay upbeat, confident he could find another mill job somewhere else in the state,</p>
<p>Tom DeHaven, 60, isn’t so sure he’ll be as fortunate. A ripsaw operator, DeHaven was scheduled to have surgery for carpal tunnel syndrome in his right wrist in the coming weeks. The fate of his health insurance is up in the air now.</p>
<p>He left the mill just 30 minutes before the fire started.</p>
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Josh Moore, an employee of the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon, put his son, Emmett Moore, on his shoulders to get a better view of the fire damage on Friday July 18, 2014. About 250 workers, including Moore, are affected by mill's destruction. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<div class="bat_story">
<p>Then, he says, “I got a call from my grandson. He said, ‘Your mill is burning down.’ I hurried back as fast as I could. I couldn’t believe it. It made me sick.”</p>
<p>DeHaven has worked in mills since the early 1970s, and has seen several fires, “But not like this.” He said he plans to file for unemployment insurance.</p>
<p>“It’s been a good company to work for. It’s been real steady,” he said. But, “When a job stops, a mortgage payment and everything else doesn’t. ... When you get to my age, finding another job is going to be really tough.”</p>
<p>Many workers wonder whether they’ll find another employer as fair as Swanson.</p>
<p>“I’m really nervous right now,” admitted William Suchanek, 34, watching the smoke with other employees. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”</p>
<p>Suchanek, a forklift operator who had been with the company for 18 months, said he had found his “dream job,” one he had wanted to stay on with.</p>
<p>The mill was hot and the hours long, but Suchanek and other employees said they enjoyed working at the mill and the company treated them fairly. Jeremy Larsen, 35, another forklift operator, said he was hired six months ago after fighting wildfires for eight years. Larsen said his prior job wasn’t bringing in enough income to support his wife and two-year-old son, but it now offered a fallback option for him.</p>
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<figcaption style="width:70%;margin:0 auto;">
Josh Moore, an employee of the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon, put his son, Emmett Moore, on his shoulders to get a better view of the fire damage on Friday July 18, 2014. About 250 workers, including Moore, are affected by mill's destruction. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
</figcaption>
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<div class="bat_story">
<p>“Depending on what happens, I might go back to fighting wildfires for the summer,” he said.</p>
<p>Josh Moore, a 39-year-old press operator who had worked at the mill four years, had called in sick Thursday due to heat exhaustion. He watched the smoke from his backyard near the mill and then evacuated his wife and two children to his parents’ home in the Thurston area.</p>
<p>Moore said he’s girding to seek a new job but his outlook remains positive.</p>
<p>“Everything happens for a reason,” he said. “I’m a firm believer in my life, and in the past when bad things happen there’s always a reason for it. I usually end up in a better spot for it.”</p>
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<h1>Plant’s owners begin long process of deciding whether to rebuild</h1>
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<div class="pure-u-1 pure-u-md-1-2 bat_byline">
By <a href="mailto:sherri.buri_mcdonald@registerguard.com">Sherri Buri McDonald</a> | The Register-Guard
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<div class="pure-u-1 pure-u-md-1-2 bat_date">
July 19, 2014
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<p class="bat_first">Swanson Group wants to rebuild the Springfield Plywood and Veneer mill that was destroyed by fire Thursday, but it may take a couple of months for the company to sort through its options, Chief Operating Officer Chuck Wert said Friday.</p>
<p>“A plant of that nature from the ground up would cost somewhere north of $100 million,” he said. “Until we sit down and engineer and budget a new plant I don’t think anyone is in a position to decide if we have the financial wherewithal. Our desire is to rebuild the facility, but we have to look at all the options.”</p>
<p>Wert, who is based at the company’s Glendale headquarters, said he was in Eugene Friday morning to meet with the company’s insurance agent. The mill was insured, but it will take a while to sort through details, such as what the policy will cover and the difference between what the mill had been worth and what it might cost to replace it, he said.</p>
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A charred vehicle sits near the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant after Thursday’s fire. Firefighters continued to work on the fire a day later. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>As the smoke clears, the economic impacts of the mill’s loss are coming into focus. There’s the initial job losses and less local spending by mill employees; customers whose productivity might be affected by delays; local suppliers of glues, resins and fuel, who now have one less account; and the potential loss of tax revenues to the city of Springfield, Springfield schools and other taxing districts.</p>
<p>The loss of 250 “fairly high-paying jobs is sizeable when you’re looking at the total number of employees in Springfield,” said John Tamulonis, Springfield’s community development manager.</p>
<p>“It has a ripple effect,” he said. “You’ve got somewhere in the $10-million range payroll. That gets spent two to three times in the community, so it has a big impact.”</p>
<p>U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio said the “mill’s destruction is a blow to our local economy and hundreds of our friends and neighbors who worked there.”</p>
<p>He said he would reach out to Swanson Group CEO Steve Swanson on Monday and look for any opportunities to help at the federal level.</p>
<p>If the company decides to rebuild, it could be years before the mill’s 250 workers would be back on the job.</p>
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A fire hose snakes down the road near the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon Friday July 18, 2014. Firefighters had to truck in water to fight the blaze. About 250 workers are affected by mill's destruction. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>“If they started (rebuilding) today, it could be two years before a plant could be rebuilt, and that would be very aggressive,” said Steve Killgore, vice president of sales and marketing at Roseburg Forest Products in Roseburg. He was former president of McKenzie Forest Products, which sold the Springfield mill to the Swanson Group in 2007.</p>
<p>The mill site is in Springfield’s enterprise zone and a new plant there could qualify for three to five years of property tax waivers, Tamulonis said. If the Swanson Group invested at least $25 million in the new plant in equipment, they could reopen with the same number of employees, or possibly fewer, pending city council approval, he said. To qualify for the full five years of waivers, the mill would have to offer average wages and benefits, such as paid vacation and medical insurance, that are 1½ times the Lane County average, which is in the $40,000 range, Tamulonis said.</p>
<p>While the Swanson Group explores whether to rebuild the mill, it is shifting as much work as possible from Springfield to its plant in Glendale, Wert said. It is looking at adding a third shift to glue plywood panels in Glendale, as it networks with other local wood products companies to find jobs for its workers and explores the possibility of replacing temporary workers at its mills with longer term employees from Springfield, he said.</p>
<p>In addition to its Glendale plywood and veneer plant, Swanson also has a sawmill in Glendale and a stud mill in Roseburg.</p>
<p>Of the 7 million feet of plywood that were on order at Springfield, 5 million feet are being shifted to Swanson’s Glendale plant, Wert said.</p>
<p>The Glendale plant already was busy so the extra orders will be stacked on top of existing orders, meaning the Springfield orders will take several weeks longer than initially promised, Wert said.</p>
<p>The other 2 million feet of orders at the Springfield plant are for specialty products for pouring concrete and industrial products that the Glendale plant can’t make, he said.</p>
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A firefighter walks past the remains of the Springfield Plywood and Veneer plant in Springfield, Oregon on Friday July 18, 2014. Firefighters continued to work the fire that started July 17, 2014 destroying the plant and idling about 250 workers. (Andy Nelson/The Register-Guard)
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<p>About 60 percent of the Springfield mill’s products went into houses as sheathing and flooring and about 40 percent had industrial or commercial uses, Wert said. The mill shipped products across the United States and into Canada.</p>
<p>“We’ve been producing 15 million feet a month at Springfield,” Wert said. “You pull that much wood out of the marketplace all at once and it creates a little bit of a panic, and there’s a fairly significant ripple effect in the marketplace.”</p>
<p>The mill’s loss shouldn’t disrupt the overall plywood market long-term, but it may cause a bit of a scramble in the short-term, wood products industry experts said.</p>
<p>“Western plywood mills were pretty well booked and the market was fairly strong,” said Jon Anderson, publisher of Random Lengths, a wood products trade publication based in Eugene. “I guess it will be kind of a scramble to fill any of the orders that the Swansons aren’t able to fill at their other plant.”</p>
<p>Swanson Group overhauled the Springfield mill after buying it in 2007. It upgraded the veneer dryers; the lathe, which spins and peels logs to produce veneer; and the “lathe charging system,” an automated system that optimizes the amount and quality of the veneer.</p>
<p>The mill had gone through a succession of owners, but none had updated the mill much since Georgia-Pacific owned it in the 1960s, Swanson told the Register-Guard in 2008.</p>
<p>Swanson “invested millions into it,” Killgore said. “Quite a bit of it was state-of-the-art plywood equipment. They made a significant investment to that facility.”</p>
<p>Most mill insurance policies force owners to accept a substantial reduction in benefits if they don’t rebuild, said John Murphy, CEO of Murphy Co., who rebuilt his company’s mill in Sutherlin after it burned in 2005.</p>
<p>“If it’s a replacement-cost (policy), you have to rebuild at the full value that you insured for,” he said. “We had replacement cost insurance, so we rebuilt.”</p>
<p>The fire struck the Springfield plant at a time of steady demand in the market. Plywood plants in North America produce a total of about 11 billion feet a year, Killgore said.</p>
<p>“The economy is ever so slowly improving,” he said. “We’ve had a relatively good market here starting in March, so it’s really unfortunate for them. This is the peak season for demand.</p>
<p>“For Swanson Group these things are a blow,” Killgore said. “They’re insured, so long-term it’s not catastrophic to the company by any means. These are difficult situations to work through — lots of details with employees, getting them situated and moving on with their lives; investigating the fire; and determining ‘Do we rebuild?’ They have a lot of work ahead of them. I wish them well.”</p>
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<h3 id="related" style="margin:1em 0 .5em 0;">Related coverage:</h3>
<ul style="font-size:1.2em;line-height:1.5em;letter-spacing.02em;">
<li><a href="http://projects.registerguard.com/turin/2014/jul/18/owners-to-consider-rebuilding-plant/">Owners consider rebuilding plant</a></li>
<li><a href="http://projects.registerguard.com/rg/news/local/31924830-75/asbestos-debris-property-company-fire.html.csp">Mill fire cleanup expands outward</a></li>
<li><a href="http://projects.registerguard.com/rg/news/local/31999701-75/evacuation-confusion.html.csp">Evacuation confusion</a></li>
<li><a href="http://projects.registerguard.com/turin/2014/aug/17/mill-fire-investigation-may-take-up-to-a-year/">Mill investigation may take up to a year</a></li>
<li><a href="http://projects.registerguard.com/turin/2014/aug/23/drone-debate-poised-to-soar/">Drone debate poised to soar</a></li>
</ul>
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