FREDERICKTOWN, Mo. (News First) – The Fredericktown Fire Department issued a serious warning on Wednesday in regard to the fire at the fairly new Critical Mineral Recovery, a lithium-ion battery processing plant, along Highway OO in Fredericktown. The warning said citizens are urged to SHELTER IN PLACE INDOORS if they are in the smoke plume area because of the industrial fire at 815 Highway OO. Close windows, and doors and turn off window AC units. The only evacuation order, at the moment, is for those living on Madison County Road 277. Current modeling shows smoke moving to the north of the fire. Explosions were also reported throughout the facility. The smoke, which is considered toxic, had moved north into parts of St. Francois County. According to the Fredericktown mayor’s Facebook post, no one has been injured. He also says firefighters from St. Louis to Cape Girardeau were called to the scene. Fire crews were on standby to battle the hot spots Wednesday night and once that may creep up on Thursday. As of right now, there’s no word on how this fire started.
According to Missouri Independent News, the fire erupted despite what the company’s website calls quote “likely the most sophisticated automated and remote supervised and controlled fire suppression systems in the world. “The state-of-the-art fire prevention system is designed to detect fires before they start,” The system covers all areas where battery materials are stored or processed. It is monitored remotely 24/7 employing high-intensity industrial forward-looking infrared…camera technology.”
As of 8:30 Wednesday night, if you attempted to go to the company’s website, all you get is the “This site can’t be reached” generic page.
