Fire breaks out at Cleveland scrap metal facility

CLEVELAND, Ohio (WOIO) – A fire at a Cleveland scrap metal facility Tuesday resulted in smoke that could be seen throughout the Union-Miles neighborhood.

“It’s just dark you can’t see some of the cranes because the smoke is so thick, the flame is above the pile, it’s just bad, just a bad fire,” said Blaize Watts, inspector at the company that went up in flames Tuesday.

It was hard to miss the thick, heavy smoke if you were in Cuyahoga County Tuesday.

“I was walking into my neighborhood off 52nd and Fleet and I seen the smoke and I thought it was the high school on fire, South High School and when I got closer it was behind the high school,” said neighbor, John Kostura.

Blaize Watts is an inspector at Ferrous Processing and Trading on Aetna Road in Cleveland. He said the fire started at about 5 in the evening.

“I was getting ready to leave work just walking down and just see smoke coming and you hear over the radio hey we got a fire,” Watts said. “We grab our hoses what not and start spraying it down.”

Watts said a huge pile of tires, wires, and car parts, covered in oil went up in flames.

“I wouldn’t really blame the company if anything hot sun beaming on it a bunch of bright material, gas going everywhere, oil going everywhere it was bound to happen,” Watts said.

Employees said the fire did do a lot of damage so they believe the company will suffer a financial loss.

Multiple fire crews were seen responding to the incident. No one was hurt in the fire.

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