COLUMBUS – Columbus fire investigators say damage from the intensity of the heat during a fire in a West Side storage facility last month has made it impossible to decide what caused the fire at Dick Cold Storage, which left the building destroyed and left rotting food products out in the summer air where the smell has made life unpleasant for the warehouse’s neighbors.
The heat of the fire, the length of time it burned and efforts to put it out all made evidence about the cause of the fire in the building at 3080 Valleyview Drive very hard to come by, Battalion Chief Steve Martin said.
“After evaluating expectations of evidence that might be left after such a hot and long-burning fire, aggravated by the contamination and/or destruction of any evidence by the crews working to make the building safe, it has been determined that there could be no chance to make a positive determination as to where and how the fire started,” he wrote in a release Wednesday.
The fire also destroyed refrigerated trucks, leaving ham stored at the facility exposed to the hot summer air, where it began to rot, sending a rancid odor into the air around Valleyview and attracting pests.
Martin says intense heat from the August 19 fire caused the steel skeleton of the building to warp and twist, causing sections of the building to collapse and created the threat of further collapses without warning.
Fire and private insurance investigators were told to stay out of the building until it could be made safe, Martin said.
Demolition crews have been working to knock down everything that might fall while also removing the rotting meat, he said.