HILLCREST — Area fire departments responded to a report of smoke at a greenhouse facility in Hillcrest on Friday evening, Rochelle Fire Department Lt. Jason Underwood said Saturday.
Rochelle Fire received a call at 5:34 p.m. Friday for a structure fire at NuEra Hillcrest, LLC at 16280 E. Twombly Road. NuEra Hillcrest is a cannabis growing facility. The first fire crews arrived at 5:42 p.m. and saw no flames showing from outside the building. Crews were then alerted to a single greenhouse full of smoke.
"We entered that greenhouse and smoke filled the room to the floor," Underwood said. "We didn't see fire or flames and the temperatures were at 130-140 degrees and not very high. It was tough to see. We worked with the facility to get an exhaust fan turned on. Once we were certain there wasn't a big fire, we used the exhaust fan and more fans and over 30 minutes we cleared the smoke out and we could tell the fire was extinguished."
Underwood said the greenhouse impacted by smoke did not have any plants in it at the time of the fire. The cause and source of the fire are still under investigation and the smell and color of the smoke indicated plastic burning. The structure did not sustain damage.
Responding departments were Rochelle Fire, the Ogle-Lee Fire Protection District stations of Hillcrest, Flagg Center, Creston and Steward, Lynn-Scott-Rock Fire, Stillman Fire, DeKalb Fire, Shabbona Fire and Malta Fire. Fire crews cleared the scene at 8:18 p.m.
"A building filled with black smoke typically means a big fire," Underwood said. "It just didn't in this case. We had a lot of response due to the details of the call and our box alarm and mutual aid protocols. There were no injuries."
Underwood said the monetary amount of damage to the facility is unclear, and that there was "slight smoke spread" to at least one more greenhouse that had plants in it.
With a number of greenhouse facilities like NuEra in Rochelle Fire's coverage area, Underwood said fire crews have toured those facilities in the past to get familiar with the layouts and technologies in place in case of incidents like Friday's.
"It's invaluable to have that information and familiarity," Underwood said. "Just like it's invaluable to have the assistance of personnel at the facility. It's a modern greenhouse with controlled temperature, circulation and lighting. It's about knowing the materials that are in a facility and what happens when they burn. That preparation helped us last night. It was a relief that it was mostly smoke and not a big fire. We're always happy when things work out that way and there's no structural damage."
