Multiple Fire Departments Respond To Large Fire In Nowata County

A large fire in Nowata County is still smoking, even after nearly a dozen fire departments responded.

The buildings owned by Robinson Pallet Company used to be a school, but it hadn't seen a graduating class since the 1990s.

Nearly 70 firefighters responded to the fire and said crews had to drive as far as Nowata to fill up on water. It took them much of the night to get it under control.

A place once stacked with piles of pallets is replaced with ashes and soot.

“Pallets with ambient design and stacked the way they are, they’re made for air to go through them. They’re oak. They burn hot. They put out a lot of BTUs," said Tommy Gipson, New Alluwe Volunteer Fire Department.

The property was full of pallets waiting to be moved to Robinson Pallet Company's new location in Adair.

“I lived here my whole life. We used to work here. We’re in Adair now. We’ve had it for probably a good three months," said Lester Robinson, Robinson Pallet Company Supervisor. "We had plans, once the weather cooled off, to kind of clean it up a little bit but we just didn’t get there, as you can see."

The buildings used to be a school.

“My wife, she graduated from Alluwe School. One of the last ones to graduate from there. [...] Lived here all her life but lived on the same piece of property since she was 13," said Gipson.

Assistant Fire Chief Tommy Gipson said this place means a lot to New Alluwe natives.

“This little town, you hear the New Alluwe and then you hear Alluwe. This originally was Alluwe. When the lake came in it flooded out the town, a lot of it was moved to here and established here. Some of the other houses, they were moved to surrounding towns like Nowata and Chelsea, but this town’s got a lot of history value to it. It’s sad when you see one of the buildings that still had some meaning to a lot of the locals here that grew up here, they’re heartbroken," said Gipson.

Gipson said Sunday night was probably the fifth fire he's responded to at this location.

"In the 13 years I’ve been here, there have been multiple fires at that location, at the building and the pallets surrounding it," said Gipson. "[...] Sometimes just parts of the building; sometimes large pallets where we were trying to protect the building to keep it from getting bigger.”

He said this one was particularly bad because it impacted the surrounding area.

“When I got on scene last night, I had to back the engine up, where I normally would’ve pulled on a house fire or anything else. It was singeing hair off of my arm with my arm just at the window of the truck, and we had to back up. It was that hot and I was in between the house that was losing its siding and the fire, so yeah, needless to say it was hot," said Gipson.

He said the old elementary building was damaged a few years ago, and last month the former high school and gym burned down.

Eleven agencies responded to the fire which was made more difficult by the dry conditions.

The fire also destroyed a shed, a car, a semi, and melted the siding off of three homes.

Gipson said what's left standing on the property is a cosmetology building and library.

"Coffeyville Foundry came down with a foam unit that quite frankly saved a lot of man hours [...]," said Gipson. “I’m just thankful nobody was hurt. Everybody went home, and when you see that many agencies come together and accomplish what we did last night and last month, it makes you proud to be a part of this."

"We still had a lot here that we could’ve used but there’s nothing we can do about it now," said Robinson. "Just gotta rebuild and go from there and keep everything going.”

Firefighters are investigating the cause of the fire.