Spontaneous combustion likely behind nursery fire

By Toni McDonald

Fire and Emergency NZ staff attended a fire at a bulk landscape supplies storage facility at Diack's Nurseries in Invercargill today.

Multiple firefighters, using breathing apparatus, and three hoses were used to fight the pea straw facility fire.

Nursery staff believe spontaneous combustion may have been responsible for the start of the blaze.

A nursery staff member told the Otago Daily Times another staff member, who discovered a small fire had started in the straw stack, was unable to contain it. The fire quickly escalated out of control and the fire service were called in.

Contents of shipping containers flanking the straw stack also needed to have the contents removed and extinguished, after internal heat began to ignite the contents.

Police were on site to redirect traffic away from the scene on the corner of Inglewood Rd and Tweed St.