Big heavy smoke clouded the sky as a fire roared underneath atPhillips Bark Processing Company on County Farm Road Monday eveningand into early Tuesday morning.

It took all eight of Lincoln County’s volunteer firedepartments, a unit from Brookhaven Fire Department, severalmembers of six Pike County volunteer fire departments, personnelfrom McComb Fire Department and Collins Fire Department, multipletankers and a lot of equipment to extinguish the blaze that beganaround 6 p.m.

The firefighting would finally settle around 2 a.m. Tuesday. Noserious injuries were reported.

“I’ve been doing this five and a half years and it’s one of theworst ones I’ve responded to,” said Heuck’s Retreat Volunteer FireDepartment Assistant Chief David Case.

Case said he noticed that something was wrong when he passed thebark processing company while returning home from work. He sawvisible flames about 8 or 9 feet above the roof of a rear buildingat the plant.

“Once it caught, it carried,” said Case. “It picked up and wentquick.”

Sheriff Steve Rushing said the cause of the fire is still underinvestigation, as firefighters were working until the early morninghours to extinguish the flames.

Phillips Bark Processing Company President David Phillips said amaintenance man heard a pop and, after looking at videosurveillance, said the fire may have started down in a water welllocated between the package bag storage building and maintenancebuilding. Due to the high winds, the flames carried from theinitial site of the fire to a nearby packaging building.

Phillips described the inferno as a “perfect storm.”

“Of course it knocked out our ability to fight the fireimmediately,” he said about the plant’s firefighting resources.

As the company suffered a great deal of damage to equipment andstorage facilities, Phillips said the bulk wood chip product -which represents 40 percent of the business – would still beshipped today.

“We just can’t quit. We’re going to just be rebuilding,” saidPhillips. “Hopefully, in eight weeks we’ll be back to fullproduction.”

Thanks to the large response and noble efforts of areafirefighters, the plant’s processing building and coloring machinewere saved.

“We certainly thank all the responders and the Brookhaven FireDepartment,” said Phillips. “They did a fantastic job of keepingthe loss from being larger than what it would have been.”

With dark clouds overhead caused by hot flames rather than rain,it took a team effort to unleash the amount of water and foamneeded to extinguish the fire.

Collins Fire Department brought the foam used to finally put outthe flames. About five tankers came from Pike County, which wereneeded due to the nonexistent hydrants in the area, and McComb FireDepartment brought a portable cascade system used to fill air tankson scene.

“These guys from these other counties, they didn’t hesitate,their only question was, ‘What did you need us to bring?,’ and theyshowed up with it,” said Hog Chain Volunteer Fire Department ChiefJohn Hart. “I think the people of Lincoln County need to know theyhave good neighbors.”

Case, who was one of the first on the scene, said he was calledback out to the site of the Monday blaze around 4:30 Tuesdaymorning to extinguish a few hot spots and keep watch over theash.

When the volunteer firefighters finally left the scene at 6a.m., he had little time to get ready to return the job he wasleaving when he first spotted the flames nearly 12 hoursearlier.

“It’s going to be a long day,” said Case.