Neighborhood safe after industrial fire

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - A massive industrial fire in Buffalo's Black Rock neighborhood had firefighters on scene for almost a day. What a difference about 24 hours makes. Thursday morning the massive fire on Chandler Street is out, and the air is safe again.

Overnight, Buffalo firefighters continued to put out hot spots at Niagara Lubricants in Buffalo’s Black Rock neighborhood. The family run lubricant manufacturer went up in flames around 5:30 a.m. Wednesday.

Inside Wednesday, chemicals burned sending dangerous smoke into the neighborhood and beyond. Thursday morning, all that's changed.

"It's pretty much dissipated and were very thankful for that. We think it's very safe right now in the neighborhood," said Fire Commissioner Garnell Whitfield.

Putting out the fire was no easy task for first responders and the more than 100 firefighters on scene.

"This is absolutely debilitating to the Buffalo Fire Department. We had to call people in and make sure the rest of the city was adequately staffed and we used a tremendous amount of resources here, in terms of foam we called for a lot of help from other agencies. We had the air force here. We had the airport crash truck here," said the commissioner.

Because of the dangerous chemicals in the air all of the first responders and firefighters were ordered to get a doctor's check up.

"We're checking everybody. We want to make sure our guys and gals are safe. So we're checking on them, people who were exposed to the fumes or whatever, people who were working the scene, we're doing baselines on them. There's a doctor here, they take blood pressure and all those sorts of things like that," said the commissioner.

Niagara Lubricants has been around for 88 years and employs 35 people. News 4 learned some of those workers will be back to work Thursday morning at a different site, producing lubricants.

The fire is still under investigation. Now that it's out, officials will begin trying to determine the cause of the blaze. Damage could be in the millions.

Fortunately, after all of this, no one was seriously injured.