Malfunctioning machinery looks to be the cause of a fire that broke out early Monday evening in the Sherman Hall crematorium, melting a section of the building's roof and causing thousands of dollars of damage, officials said.
The fire appears to have ignited within a new fan device in an incinerator used by the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences for cremation of medical research cadavers, said John Grela, director of Public Safety. No one was injured in the blaze.
"As far as we can determine, there was a fire in the chimney in a new exhaust fan that they put in," said Grela. "It wasn't open properly when they went to use it, and that's what caused the fire."
Yearly, Sherman Hall cremates 250 to 300 bodies that have been donated to the university for scientific research, sometimes cremating two to three bodies a day, according to Raymond Dannenhoffer, assistant dean for Support Services.
The fan device had been installed a few days ago, he said, in response to a complaint of odors coming from the crematory. The new fan was installed to blow the exhaust higher into the air to better disperse any scents, he said.
The crematorium had been used several times since the installation of the new fan, said Dannenhoffer, and officials do not know what caused the fan to malfunction.
Lou Schmidt, director of Facilities Operations, estimates the damaged section of the roof to be around 40 square feet. Monetary damage has not yet been assessed, he said, though he expects the amount will be in the thousands of dollars.
Dannenhoffer said there have never been any incidents like this at the Sherman Hall crematorium in the past. In August of 2002, however, during a lab specimen incineration, a burner malfunctioned in Hochstetter Hall sending thick clouds of black smoke into the sky and summoning local fire crews.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
