WATERBURY, Conn. — A fire that broke out at a scrapyard off Route 8 early Thursday morning has impacted the nearby Naugatuck River after petroleum entered the waterway, state environmental officials said.
Westbury fire crews were called to the Albert Brothers Scrapyard on East Aurora St. just before 9:30 a.m. Officials said the fire itself was contained to the scrapyard and no nearby buildings were in danger.
Smoke and steam from the fire were seen billowing over Route 8 and could be seen on Interstate 84.
A spokesperson with the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) said Thursday that its emergency response unit was called to the scrapyard to assist the local fire personnel and the state National Guard Civil Support team.
In a statement, DEEP said the cause of the fire is petroleum-based and petroleum has impacted the Naugatuck River.
“Booms are being deployed by DEEP personnel to contain run-off,” the statement said. “We are directing the property owner to hire a contractor to run samples of the impacted water for volatile organic compounds, semi volatile organic compounds, and metals.”
During a press conference, Jeff Chandler, a supervisor with DEEP’s emergency response unit, said the river was impacted after a water-oil separator used to help prevent any runoff of petroleum was overwhelmed by the amount of water used by the firefighters.
He said they expected that the separator would be overwhelmed and “got ahead of it” by setting up a containment area further down the river.
“There was petroleum runoff that got past the water-oil separator and impacted the river,” said Jeff Chandler Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (D.E.E.P) Emergency Response Unit Supervisor. “The D.E.E.P deployed boom at the outfall at the Naugatuck River and at this point we are collecting that in conjunction with Albert Bros.”
Eric Albert, president of Albert Brothers Scrapyard, said they do not know what caused the fire, but will be working on getting to the bottom of what happened.
“Our job is now to figure out what happened and to solve the problem so we don’t ever have to have that happen again,” Albert said.
He said his company does not accept petroleum products and fluids. He also thanked the first responders who he said did an amazing job to keep the fire under control.
“We will get to the bottom of what happened and work to prevent it,” he said.
Chandler added that the petroleum that was found in the runoff came from the burning of plastics from the scrap materials on site. He said samples will be taken from the river for testing and additional air quality testing will be completed.
According to the scrapyard's website, it is a fourth-generation family-owned industrial and retail scrap metal recycling business in Waterbury for more than 119 years.
The Deputy Fire Chief said they had been called to this scrapyard before, but incidents were not frequent.
The cause of the fire was still under investigation early Thursday evening.
