South Royalton
Design Contempo Inc. will keep its six full-time employees on the clock throughout cleanup efforts and will provide them with transportation to the company’s furniture factory in northern Grafton County if work is needed, DCI owner Henry Kober said.
“Those individuals will be busy getting the mill ready,” Kober said. “I am thankful that nobody got hurt, and we will do the best we can to get up as quickly as we can.”
The sawmill prepares and ships lumber to DCI Furniture in Lisbon, N.H., where it is made into “rugged, easy-to-assemble” furniture for college and military dormitories, the sawmill’s manager, Chris Gramling, previously said.
Even though the South Royalton sawmill will be closed for at least a month, the furniture operation shouldn’t be impacted because the company has a large lumber inventory, Kober said.
The fire started around 1 p.m. on Tuesday. Workers were able fight it with a garden hose and fire extinguishers until fire crews could arrive.
The fire is believed to have started in the bandsaw head. Just what caused the blaze isn’t clear, Kober said.
“I was down at the mill today,” he said. “It is really kind of speculation at this point.”
Royalton Fire Chief Paul Brock said on Thursday that the fire isn’t considered suspicious.
Fires at sawmills can be common because of the type of work that is performed inside.
“There are a lot of moving parts in sawmills … there are a lot of combustibles in there,” Brock said. “The nice thing about that building is it is all metal.”
Although the structure itself is OK, the equipment inside suffered “substantial” damage, Brock said.
“This fire could have been a lot worse if no one was there when it happened,” he said.
The sawmill also suffered a fire in 1999. The business is insured.
The sawmill transports one tractor-trailer truckload of lumber to Lisbon a day, Gramling previously said.
Kober bought the sawmill in 1987. He started DCI in 1975.
Jordan Cuddemi can be reached at jcuddemi@vnews.com.