Plumes of smoke were sighted near the plant’s HF2 blast furnace at 9pm on Monday, leading to concerns that the blast furnace itself had caught fire. Firefighters from Coudekerque-Branche, Dunkerque (Dunkirk), Fort-Mardyck, Gravelines, Loon-Plage, and Malo-les-Bains were dispatched to the steel plant, based in the Grande-Synthe area.
The six fire brigades arrived as reinforcements to the firefighters already on site, making up a total of 46 firefighters battling the flames.
As it turns out, the fire was not in the blast furnace but instead broke out on scaffolding tarpaulins. ArcelorMittal’s management confirmed in a statement that the fire had broken out on the scaffolding surrounding the regenerative heat exchange, which is in the process of being dismantled. The fire did not spread to the blast furnace, which restarted at around 2am on Tuesday morning.
There were no injuries in the fire.
