In a plant recycling tyre waste, fire broke out around 5 pm on a 240-tonne stockpile of semi-finished material output after crushing of the tyre waste. Fire-fighters installed 3 water nozzles and proceeded to battle the blaze using the facility’s ground clearing vehicles. The burned material was transferred into an empty compartment in the storage zone for cooling. First responders used 300cu.m of water during their intervention. This extinction water was channelled into the site’s 450cu.m containment basin prior to treatment at the neighbouring municipal water treatment plant. The clearing operation continued, with the 240 tonnes of unusable material being eliminated at a class 2 dumpsite. The fire was extinguished around 1:30 am at the same time ground clearing was completed. This outbreak apparently exerted no impact on the environment and, in all likelihood, was due to heating within the mass of the product. Start-up of the new tyre waste crushing unit had necessitated the temporary storage of these 240 tonnes while awaiting installation of an additional equipment for separating out rubber from the metal parts. It is probable that the stored material did not undergo a long enough cooling cycle, with thermal activity then developing in the middle of the stockpile. As a result of this fire, the operator decided to enhance the monitoring of stored materials and extended the programmed cooling time. Rearrangement of the material storage facility and installation of a containment basin served to limit the consequences of this fire. The storage facility was composed of eleven 450sq.m cells with a single homogeneous surface. The cells were separated by earthen dikes 5 m wide and 3 m high. The ground was covered by asphalt to allow lorries to navigate. Stormwater was disposed via a network of underground pipes. The storage height did not exceed 2 m; one of the cells was excavated in order to create a 700cu.m containment basin through which the zone’s stormwater could be channelled. This basin was equipped with a plug on the public sewer network outfall to prevent accidental discharge into the natural environment. On 23rd June, 2005, another fire broke out at the same company facilities (see ARIA no. 30099).