Explosion Sounded Like Truck Hitting the Building...

Here is a story of an explosion that occurred the first week of March 2013. What makes this story interesting is that the factory was closed, no employees were present. The root cause is a mystery as of this posting. 

The cause of a recent explosion at an aluminium extrusion plant remains under investigation, local fire chief said.

The fire department was called to the Ohio company around 8:30 PM after a trucker picking up sand at a nearby business called 911 from a cell phone.

The local fire chief said eyewitness accounts will help move the investigation along.

Although the company was already closed for the day there was still activity in the industrial park.

The chief said he hopes to talk to people who were there in the area that night to shed more light on exactly what happened. 

"If we can just determine what exactly they saw and heard it will help determine what the cause might have been," he said.

The company specializes in aluminium extrusions and fabrication, and the fire chief said the fire originated in and around one of the extrusion machines.

The machine was not on at the time and no one was inside the facility, he said.

In fact, because it was after hours the department had to wait  for a key holder to arrive to gain entry into the building.

Firefighters also had to wait until the power was shut-off to at least a portion of the facility before attacking the fire with water, fire chief said.

"Our biggest deterrent was waiting to get the power shut down. You're talking some pretty high voltage in there," he said.

Whether the power shut-off effected nearby business was unknown.

Once inside, firefighters were able to contain the blaze to the area around the machines and was able to be under control within 30 minutes.

"We were very fortunate...It didn't take us long to knock it down," he said.

The machine was located along the north wall of the building not far from a large electrical feed. The fire burned through a portion of the wall and melted the exterior siding.

The APSB is asking the readers for their educated comments.