A spokesperson said an employee and a firefighter were among those hospitalized because of the blaze.
LORTON, Va. — Richmond Highway reopened Tuesday night, hours after firefighters first responded to a massive fire at a recycling facility in Lorton.
A shelter-in-place notice for those within a one-mile radius of the fire remained in effect until 7:30 p.m. Tuesday. County facilities within a mile of the location were also closed throughout the evening.
Crews were first called to the 9900 block of Richmond Highway for a report of a fire around 1:30 p.m. Once on scene, firefighters quickly learned that someone was trapped inside a crane that was lifted 40 feet into the air.
"One of our initial arriving engine companies climbed the ladder that accesses the crane itself. They were able to reach the occupant of the crane," said Fairfax County Deputy Fire Chief Greg Hunt.
He told WUSA9 the man was unconscious when firefighters reached him.
"They packaged him and were able to lower him, utilizing one of our aerial ladders when it arrived on scene. So leveraging one of our tower ladders, we were able to place a bucket higher, remove the victim to that bucket, and take them to the ground," Hunter said.
The man was airlifted to a hospital with what the fire chief described as "life-threatening injuries."
A total of seven people were injured, including the worker. Among the others injured was a Fort Belvoir Fire Department firefighter. The chief said the firefighter was in stable condition.
Sky9 was over the scene on Tuesday afternoon. Smoke could be seen pouring into the sky.
A four-alarm was called to get more firefighters from neighboring jurisdictions to the scene. Four units were called to the scene with at least 225 personnel.
Crews used excavators and cranes to dismantle the stacked scrap metal piles into the evening, turning them into horizontal layers to apply water directly to the burning material. The process was slow and methodical due to the nature of the scrap and ongoing hazards.
"We basically have to pull this fire apart piece by piece in order to extinguish it," explained Hunter.
The facility does not have any fire hydrants on the property, which made it difficult for the initial crew to gain access to a water supply.
Crews had to use a mixture of water and foam to get the flames under control. Once flames were contained, crews had to go in and manually delayer the metal scraps, which the chief explained could take a few hours.
Hunter explained that first responders faced many challenges and obstacles while battling the blaze, including the weather.
"The wind basically pushed the smoke down to the ground instead of lifting it as we would normally see a big column of smoke in the air, so that exposed a lot of people initially to the smoke on the property," Hunter explained. The wind's shifting direction also complicated firefighting efforts.
On top of that, the material burning, he explained, sent toxic fumes into the air.
"It required all of our firefighters wearing self-contained breathing apparatus, or SCBA, on the exterior," said Hunter. "That's something we generally really only wear on the interior of a fire immediately adjacent. We had firefighters on breathing air the entire time."
Several firefighters were seen getting hosed down and scrubbed as they left the immediate scene.
The smoke was toxic, he explained, due to burning plastic, metals, and rubber. Hunter noted the health risks, saying, "Fires release a lot of carcinogens, and that's an activity that we practice regularly to decon our gear and decon our equipment."
By around 6:15 p.m., the chief shared that they were no longer getting hazardous air quality readings.
"We have reached a point where there are no hazardous readings immediately on the scene," Chief Hunter said around 6:15 p.m. "But we need to allow that air and the condition to dissipate over the next hour."
By Tuesday night, the shelter-in-place order issued earlier due to air quality concerns was lifted.
Hunter reassured nearby residents, saying, "You will likely detect a slight odor. Those are odors because this was plastic and tires, rubber, things like that that burn along with the metal, so they can have some residual off-gassing. There is no hazard to the community. Any hazards are contained completely to the property itself."
He said that the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality had been notified and would be doing follow-up monitoring.
Hunter urged anyone experiencing symptoms after exposure to call 911.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
WUSA9 reached out to Davis Industries Inc., but hadn't heard back as of 10:30 p.m. Tuesday.