Pollution
Humain
Environnement
Economique

An arson fire erupted around 2 am on a semitrailer loaded with compacted bales of cardboard and parked on the outdoor “waste” platform of a refrigerated food produce warehouse. The fire spread to 50 adjoining wooden pallets and then, from heat radiation, to a stockpile of 2,400 pallets 4 m away. The heat emanated by the blaze caused 7 of the 25 (13-kg capacity) propane bottles stored in a cell at a 5-m distance to explode. The security monitoring firm notified the operator and fire-fighters at 2:34 am; they arrived onsite at respectively 2:45 and 2:50. First responders needed 70 min to bring the fire under control using the site’s fire protection system and standpipes. The 2-hour fire door and fire walls prevented spreading to the facility’s buildings; extinction water was collected in a retention basin. The arsonist, caught on surveillance camera, was apprehended within 48 hours by gendarme officers. Subsequent to this incident, the operator placed gas bottles at least 10 m from storage zones for combustibles and moreover limited the quantity of stacked pallets by increasing their removal frequency. No indication was provided regarding eventual property damage sustained to the refrigeration installations containing ammonia (NH3).