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Sumter fire crews scaling back as fire at old V.B. Williams building shrinks

Sumter Fire crews have made a lot of progress and are even downsizing some of their operations, after more than a day of fighting a massive blaze at the former V.B.

Sumter Fire crews have made a lot of progress and are downsizing some of their operations after more than a day of fighting a massive blaze at the former V.B. Williams Furniture Plant.

Credit: Kayland Hagwood
Fire crews assist with extinguishing flames at former V.B. Williams building.

“As of today, we’re starting to downgrade some of our operations,” Sumter Fire Division Chief Joey Duggan said. “We’re still going to be out here for several days, but we’re able to be able to get some of the hose off the main thoroughfare in the roadway…. It’s pretty much under control, it’s just going to take a lot of water.”

Investigators with the State Law Enforcement Division (SLED) have been called in to assist in the investigation, as the cause of the fire remains unknown.

“You know, with it being a 500,000 sq. ft. structure, we’ve again called in some people to help us,” Division Chief Duggan said. “There’s no way locally that we could do it ourselves, so we have to call in our partners to be able to help us.”

Other groups are on hold due to Hurricane Zeta.

RELATED: Wind, storms possible later today

“The storm that’s coming in today is actually kind of limiting us as far as who we can bring in from across the state because they’ve got to make sure they protect their own community as well, so we might look at the next day or two bringing in more man power to be able to help us on that side of it, but right now we’re just going to try to use our local man power to be able to try to contain it and continue to work on just putting out the hotspots from this point,” Division Chief Duggan said.

Locals are asked to avoid the area while crews continue to work.

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