ST CATHERINE, Jamaica – A fire at the Wisynco plant in Lakes Pen, St Catherine, Friday evening is not expected to disrupt operations at the company.

According to Head of Operations at Wisynco, Craig Clare, the fire was at a pallet repair yard on the compound, which prevented any major damage to the main buildings on the premises, including head office and the manufacturing plant.

“We are at the present moment unaware of how the fire started. The fire happened in a pallet repair yard. So far we have no casualties to report. A minor loss of some property, we have lost two of the contractor trucks, two of the 10-ton trucks and we have lost about 50 pallets but the rest of it was garbage that was ignited in the fire.

“We don’t expect any disruption of service and we would love to thank God for the good fortune and we are very grateful that no one was injured.”

Clare credited the Spanish Fire Station of the Jamaica Fire Brigade (JFB) for responding to the emergency call quickly. He stated that the water facility that was built on the complex after the 2016 fire also assisted in ensuring that major damage was not done.

“I would like to take the opportunity to big up the Spanish Town Fire Brigade. They did an outstanding job. They were on the scene within minutes of us reporting the incident and they were able to refill here.

“We had great access to water and we had a much better containment of the fire than the previous fire in 2016, so I think a lot of times the fire brigade gets a bad rap and they did a fantastic job. Very brave men and women out there fighting it,” he said, while cooling down operation was still in progress.

Meanwhile, District Officer, Public Relations of JFB, Kerry-Gayle Forbes, said the fire was brought under control quickly with the work done by five units from Spanish Town, Portmore and May Pen.

“At about 6:40 we received a call that there was a fire at the Wisynco property and when we responded we recognised that the fire was confined to the truck yard. There were two trucks that were on fire and two containers,” Forbes said.

“We managed to extinguish the blaze and get it under control real quickly. The containers didn’t have anything in them. The trucks were empty.

“(It was a) Very quick response from the Spanish Town Fire Station along with Portmore. We also got some help from the May Pen Fire Station with a water tender, so we had three trucks and two tankers,” Forbes said.

There was a major fire at the facility in 2016. The refurbished building was reopened in 2017.