Blaze leaves door maker with minor damage

Woodfold officials say a quick response and building safeguards kept the fire from spreading to warehouses stocked with wood

By Gunnar Olson

The Forest Grove News-Times, May 9, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (6 Reader comments)

Chase Allgood / News-Times

Lt. Rick Schneider of the Forest Grove Fire Department works on cleanup at Woodfold, site of a three-alarm fire early Monday.

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By all accounts, employees of Woodfold, Inc. are lucky to be making doors this week — and not shoveling piles of smoldering ash.

A fire broke out around 3:30 a.m. Monday in a partially covered area that the Forest Grove manufacturer used to store a dump truck, which is believed to have been the source of the first spark. Had the blaze spread it could have reached a couple hundred thousand board-feet of wood.

But fire walls and a sprinkler system contained the flames before they could destroy some of the company’s more crucial operations, and fire agencies extinguished the flames within two hours. No one was injured. Damages are estimated at $150,000-plus.

“If that building had not had a sprinkling system, it’s likely we would all still be there,” David Nemeyer, fire inspector for the Forest Grove Fire Department, said nearly four hours after the fire was put out at 5:30 a.m. “The fire sprinklers did their job today. It really showed how important they are.”

The stakes were huge for Forest Grove and the surrounding area. Woodfold is one of the city’s largest employers, with 125 employees, who are also shareholders in the employee-owned company.

Woodfold builds accordion doors, among other things, and does upward of $17 million in sales annually.

Had the fire been worse, the timing couldn’t have made a blacker mark on Woodfold’s calendar: 2007 is the year of its 50th anniversary. Instead, 2007 will also be remembered as a year when Woodfold dodged a bullet.

Just hours after the fire, 75 percent of Woodfold’s operations were running, said Vice President John Doran. He predicted that it could be operating fully by the end of the week, when electricians will have had time to reroute some major electrical work that was damaged in the blaze.

“I would guess that within a week, you’ll hardly be able to tell anything happened,” he said, commending the local fire agencies.

The fire was discovered by Forest Grove police officer Chris Taaca, who smelled smoke in the area and was able to pinpoint its location at the Woodfold site.

The fire was “fully involved” by the time firefighters arrived at the four-acre industrial campus, at the corner of B Street and 19th Avenue, a few minutes after police reported the blaze.

Drama came soon after, as empty metal drums, sealed tight, exploded in the heat.

One woman said the blasts — she heard five — were so loud they woke her at her house eight blocks away. Nemeyer said one drum wrapped itself around a piece of structural steel like aluminum foil around a potato.

Doran stressed that the detonating drums had nothing to do with the traces of chemical left inside. (The nonflammable liquid is used to balance the acidity level of water for a boiler.)

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