A violent fire ravages two company hangars
Le Dauphiné, November 28, 2024 (excerpt)
The alarm was sounded shortly before 2 a.m. on the night of Wednesday November 27 to Thursday November 28. A violent fire was ravaging buildings along the Route de Montélimar (RD 540), in La Bâtie-Rolland, east of Montélimar. On arrival on the scene, the fire department found two hangars of the Soterex company, part of the Poisson corporation, which specializes in public works in quarries, completely engulfed in flames.
A large-scale fire-fighting operation was launched. At the height of the response, almost 80 firefighters were engaged to fight the flames. For safety reasons, the nearby departmental road was closed to traffic. Fortunately, there were no injuries, but the damage was considerable. One of the two hangars housing equipment and two vans collapsed. Shortly after 2 p.m. on Thursday afternoon, twelve hours after the start of the fire, the blaze was not considered to have been extinguished.
Following initial observations during the night by the Pierrelatte Gendarmes, an investigation was launched to determine the cause of the incident. Various surveys were also carried out by criminal identification technicians.
Note from Ras la Mine (who sourced it from the Poisson company’s own site):
“For several years now, our company SOTEREX, which specializes in extraction using draglines, has been taking part in the redevelopment of certain quarry sites at the end of their production cycle!
The aim of this action? Restructuring these areas to make them natural or recreational zones, while at the same time reconstituting ecosystems to support flora and fauna.
In what way? Even before quarrying begins, we need to plan for its final redevelopment. The two actions are carried out jointly:
Extraction of raw materials for processing and marketing, SOTEREX’s primary mission.
- The reuse of unused materials for redevelopment purposes (topsoil, waste rock or boulders, etc.).”