Frick Services officials last week were not ready to declare a total loss to the fertilizer blending and bagging warehouse that was ravaged by fire late in the evening June 20 at the Ports of Indiana Burns Harbor. Frick Services Chief Operating Officer Dan Frick wouldn’t put a figure on the loss or disclose how much fertilizer went up in flames. He confirmed there were no injuries since the building, where seven employees work, was unoccupied at the late hour.
Co-owner Merrill Frick reported that the steel building was an older structure that completely lost its siding and roof, but it’s yet to be decided if the frame structure that was still standing could be restored. He said there was no indication of the cause of the fire.
In the meantime, Frick is looking at some of the other buildings the company operates at the port as possible temporary locations for the blending and bagging operations.
Dan Frick said the whole facility, including inventory, suffered significant damage, including empty fertilizer bags that were stored there. The local press reported that the Portage firefighters responded under three-alarm conditions and found heavy black smoke, presumably from thousands of paper bags feeding the flames, pouring from the building. Crews were on the scene until about 4 a.m. Saturday. At one point firefighters used a pay loader to knock down portions of the wall to gain access and spray water and foam into the interior. Porter County HazMat was called in as a precaution, but no contamination was found. A 200-gallon tank of diesel fuel inside the building leaked some of its contents – which ignited – but otherwise remained intact.
Port officials said the 24,000 square foot warehouse, built in 1975, is owned by the Ports of Indiana and leased to Frick Services. Frick Services started port operations in 1975 and presently operates several liquid and dry bulk fertilizer facilities, including distribution and storage. There has also been strong demand for Frick’s lawn-care fertilizers from the growing northwest Indiana and Chicago area.
Frick’s largest facility at the port is a 160,000 st dry fertilizer warehouse that was not involved in the fire. The site has liquid fertilizer capacity of 19 million gallons.
Frick Services, which is engaged in farm service agronomy retail and wholesale, is also a large supplier of road salt used extensively on northwest Indiana roadways during the winter. In 2007, Frick Services moved 154,000 st of dry fertilizer and 42,000 st of liquid fertilizer through the port. Frick’s primary products are potash, which is mainly imported from Canada, and urea and phosphates, which are transported by barge up the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers. Overall at the port, Frick Services employs 80 at its fertilizer and grain facilities in Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan.