Massive fire breaks out at northwest Atlanta junkyard

Fire crews worked for hours to put out a massive blaze at a northwest Atlanta salvage yard, officials said.

Atlanta Fire Rescue started receiving numerous calls about a heavy column of smoke hovering over metro Atlanta about 9:30 a.m., according to spokesman Sgt. Cortez Stafford.

Credit: JOHN SPINK / JOHN.SPINK@AJC.COM

Credit: JOHN SPINK / JOHN.SPINK@AJC.COM

Officials were able to pinpoint the source of the smoke to a junkyard and metal recycling facility in the 800 block of Regina Drive near Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway, he said.

Crews pulled up to the salvage yard and tried to knock down the flames, which had broken out among a pile of recycling material, Stafford said.

However, they were not immediately successful.

“The fire was already deep-seated in a large pile of metal recycling material that is about 20 feet high” he said.

Plumes of smoke hovered over metro Atlanta as multiple units work to extinguish the fire. Fire rescue officials called it an “extended operation.”

The fire department requested ladder trucks and a foam unit, Stafford said. Officials couldn’t identify everything that was in the pile of recycling material, and that made it too dangerous to put a firefighter on top of the pile.

“Right now we are trying to put as much water on it as we can,” Stafford said while crews worked to contain the fire.

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