Maricella Miranda
Pioneer Press
ROSEMOUNT, Minn. — A feed-processing plant in Rosemount shut down Wednesday while company officials investigated a small explosion that started a fire inside machinery.
The blaze ignited late Tuesday at Endres Processing, a company that turns old bakery goods into livestock feed, Rosemount Fire Chief Scott Aker said. No one was injured.
About eight employees were working at the time.
Past fires and explosions at the plant have resulted in a worker fatality, five injured workers, serious safety violations and thousands of dollars in fines.
The company is fighting 10 labor law citations -- including two of the state’s most severe “willful” violations -- related to the 2006 death of Juan Gregorio Perez Carrasco, 37, of St. Paul, who fell into a pile of feed and suffocated. Endres faces $159,300 in fines.
The Minnesota Occupational Safety and Health Administration is not investigating Tuesday’s fire because there were no injuries. The agency could open an inquiry if an employee were to file a complaint against the company, OSHA spokesman James Honerman said.
Bryan Bergquist, director of sales and marketing at Endres, said the company did not know how the fire started or when operations would resume.
“We had over-pressure in our processing system,” he said. “We want to make sure that we understand fully what happened before we intend to restart.”
The explosion started in an area of the processing plant where machines dry livestock feed, Aker said. The blast knocked
garage doors off their tracks and damaged equipment but did not harm the building. It’s unclear whether workers were in the area at the time.
“Some of the workers indicated that they felt a little shake,” Aker said.
It took firefighters at least four hours to extinguish the flames because the fire spread through tubes used to transport and move the grain, he said.
Most of the other fires at the plant also happened in equipment at the drying bin. Aker said dust from extra-dry grain can cause explosions in high temperatures.
The plant, at 13420 Courthouse Blvd., opened in 1998.
An explosion in 2000 prompted OSHA to investigate Endres after an employee died and four others were injured. The company paid $33,000 in fines for failing to keep the plant free of grain spills and flammable dust and for not following its own safety procedures.
Complaints of two fires in 2001 at the plant, one of which injured an employee, led to a second investigation by OSHA. Endres was fined $200 for not maintaining records of inspections and for not performing preventive maintenance on equipment.
Routine checks in 2003 and 2004 resulted in eight violations and $2,835 in fines for the first visit, and one violation and $150 in fines for the second, because of problems such as failure to install railings on some stairways, not having eyewash available where needed and not monitoring air for carbon monoxide where forklifts are operated indoors.
Bergquist said he doesn’t know whether Tuesday’s blast happened during the manufacturing process. The company will cooperate with any further investigations, he said.
The Rosemount fire marshal is investigating the fire.
Copyright 2008 Pioneer Press