PRESENT POINT POWER

ABOVE: The fire observed and taken by Jan at about 7.30pm on that day from his apartment 10 km away.

Another fire and another lament by Jan that this was NOT in the English print media the next day 10^th March in his blog titled Exploding Paint Factory in Kuala Lumpur. The print media has a bottom line to make more money for each edition and they would not sacrifice another few column cms for theses fires. The fire at Batu caves was an explosive one and more loss at RM20 million than the RM10 Million one at Air Products STB Sdn Bhd (formerly Sitt Tatt Indust Gases S/B) on 1^st March 07 . Details & Pics H E R E.

This factory is making car paints and if they are on contract through a Bumi supplier to Proton, then its Ok but if they are supplying to Perodua than delivery of cars might be affected. The fire insurance adjusters would have a whale of a time shifting through the burnt out factory and the untouched admin block (spared probably by the wind direction) looking for clues that this was an ACTUAL fire and no hanky-panky. Surprisingly according to the fire department, they were ONLY alerted 30 minutes AFTER the fire started. According to reports, this is the 2^nd time they were burnt out and seemed never to learn from the past experience.

*ABOVE: Factory at No 10 Jalan Perusahawan 4, Batu Caves Industrial Estate***

The management believes that the key to business success in the business is customer satisfaction and the management will continually improve to achieve this. The Company's goals are to utilize all resources to stay abreast of the market and to be innovative in our products in order to be the market leader. For Company Profile, go H E R E
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March 10, 2007 00:27 AM

Fire Destroys Car Paint Factory, Losses Estimated At More Than RM20 Mln

KUALA LUMPUR, March 9 (Bernama) -- Mercury Paints Sdn Bhd, a factory manufacturing car paint located at the Batu Caves Industrial park here was destroyed in a fire which broke out at 6.30pm Friday. No one was injured in the incident and losses are estimated at over RM20 million. It's cause is also yet to be determined.

Selangor Fire and Rescue Department Deputy Asst Supt Esa Aini (ABOVE)said that more than 15 explosions took place in the blaze because of the chemicals used at it.

ABOVE: The admin block was spared at the begining of the fire at about 7.00 pm and BELOW by 8.3o pm, the fire was still raging

"We had to use foam to blanket the fire and it took us over three hours to bring it under control," he told reporters at the scene. He said that the department was only informed about the disaster 30 minutes after it started.

ABOVE: the belching smoke (causing pollution) at the start of the fire and BELOW, the early crowd stopping by to watch the inferno at Batu Caves

Seven fire engines, three of them equipped with Skylifts, with a total of 53 firemen were involved in the operation to estinguish the blaze. Esa said four Nepalese who were still working at the factory when the fire broke out managed to escape in the nick of time. "A neighbouring factory and a training workshop for automotive repairs nearby escaped being burnt. So too the administration block at the factory," he added.

ABOVE & BELOW: The fireballs caused by the chemicals exploding during the fire

A director of the company, Tiong Keng Fei, said that this was the second time the factory experienced a fire disaster. The first was in 1997. "In 1997, our losses was more than RM30 million.

ABOVE: The firemen too 3 hrs and more to control the fire (BELOW)

We process paints for the domestic and export markets and have been around for 30 years. "Normally the factory operations end at 6 pm but we were doing some overtime work today. I never expected it would end up like this," he said when approached by reporters at the scene. He added that the losses were high because of high cost of the machines and materials used.

ABOVE: The snorkel in action towards the end.

1 Comments:

Monsterball said...: Wah, a burning paint factory is really bad news. Most of us a familiar with paints when they are dry on a wall or spread in a thin layer waiting to dry.
Large stocks of liquid paint are really highly inflammable and can also produce toxic gases when they burn, depending on the constituents. Once the fire got going, there would have been no way to stop it.
A modern paint factory would have heavy defenses against a fire spreading, as insurers would otherwise be very reluctant to underwrite the risk. The investigation results may throw up some interesting things....; 9:08 PM