A fire broke out at the Perkins Library addition construction site Wednesday, causing the evacuation of the Old Chem building but only minor damage to the site and no injuries.
Following the fire, Durham Fire Department second district battalion chief Barry Yeargan said he would recommend that the University improve safety practices at its construction sites.
The fire began at around 11:35 a.m. from somewhat unclear causes. Yeargan said it started when workers welding steel reinforcing bars on the Perkins addition just north of Old Chem accidentally allowed the molten "rebar" to fall onto waterproofing insulation, while Lt. Tom Gustafson of the Duke University Police Department said sparks from the welding fell on the insulation. Regardless of the cause, the insulation caught fire quickly, emitting plumes of heavy black smoke that were visible as far away as Flowers Drive and causing flames that Yeargan said reached 10 to 15 feet in height.
Old Chem was then evacuated, not because it was threatened by the fire but because smoke had entered its ventilation system, Gustafson said. After a quick response by firefighters and about three minutes of putting down the flames, the displaced students, faculty and staff returned to the building.
Junior Rhys Marsh, who was in a laboratory class when the fire broke out, said the evacuation was calm. "Everybody thought it was a joke, so you just picked up your stuff and filed out," he said. "But it's real."
The only damage, Yeargan said, was to the waterproofing insulation and to a compressor that was destroyed in the blaze. The DUPD also reported a $20,000 welding machine was damaged. The physical structure of Old Chem was unaffected, and Perkins addition construction will not be set back.
Yeargan said these types of fires are not very common on construction sites, and that in fact Duke had another fire at the same site two days prior--a fire that was confined to a large compact Dumpster.
"The safety people here will I'm sure address the situation with the owners, hopefully, to see if they can put in some preventive measures," he said. While it is unclear whether the Dumpster fire was preventable, indications suggest that the insulation fire was.
Executive Vice President Tallman Trask said he had not heard about the Dumpster fire, but that the contracting company, Bovis, had not had safety problems before. He added that he would have a "conversation" with Bovis managers Thursday.
Trask expressed displeasure about the fire but defended the University's construction safety record. "[Construction site fires are] preventable and they also don't happen very often," he said. "One fire every five years doesn't surprise me. We have one building that has issues, but other than that we have very, very few issues with this."
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