Monday, July 23, 2018

Fire at Long Pond Distillery Destroys 65,000 Liters of Rum Reserves


     Jamaica’s Long Pond Distillery has lost more than 65,000 liters of rum in a fire which began in the producer’s cane fields.  The fire started in cane fields near the Long Pond distillery, midday on Monday 16 July, and spread to parts of the fermentation room and the fresh rum stocks, destroying 65,000 liters of Long Pond’s reserves.  The distillery itself and the stills were unaffected, and no staff members were injured in the fire.
     The distillery said that firefighters were called to the blaze at 1:30 pm on Monday.   Fire of unknown origin destroyed the distillery storage area at the Long Pond Sugar Factory in Trelawny on Monday afternoon of July 16th.  The fire which workers at the estate say started in a section of a cane field at the estate, burned through the cane field and engulfed the distillery room where the main stock of rum is kept. 
     A large reserve of rum in Long Pond Sugar Factory's distillery storage in Trelawny Parish was destroyed after a pile of bagasse from the sugar cane field caught fire and quickly spread to the distillery area, the Jamaica Observer reported.  Firefighters responded to the fast-moving fire and were able to contain it, but were not able to save the storage area of the distillery.  "Basically, what is happening here is that the fire is confined to the main store area. One area stores alcohol and the other section stores mainly raw material to make rum," Deputy Superintendent Roland Walters, divisional commander for the Trelawny Division of the Jamaica Fire Brigade, told the Jamaica Observer.