Blair County Judge Daniel Milliron ruled last week that a company which produced and provided lighting fixtures for the New Pig warehouse that was destroyed by fire last October is not responsible for costs associated with the investigation.
Directly after the fire, officials from New Pig offered notice to more than ten different companies stating their products may have caused the fire and they could be held liable.
Immediately, Philips Electronics North America Corp. filed an injunction which kept New Pig from doing anything at the scene of the fire until PENAC could provide an investigator to sift through the rubble.
In January, investigators from PENAC helped gather evidence from the debris, but according to Carl DeCaspers, spokesperson for New Pig, a cause of the fire has yet to be determined.
“We felt that it was only fair that if they wanted to be a part of the investigation, they should help pay the costs,” said Rebecca Cowans, vice-president of finance of New Pig.
The judges ruling states that PENAC does not have to help pay those costs.
“We’re fully insured,” said Cowans.
Cowans also noted that the source of the fire has been identified; however, those details will not be released.
DeCaspers said that prior media reports erred in stating the company would be saddled with the $200,000 investigation bill. DeCaspers said this is an insurance matter.
Meanwhile, the employees at New Pig are excited about the opening of their newest addition, Building No. 6, which is expected to be open by Dec. 15.
According to Scott Diminick, plant manager, the construction of the new building began right after the fire with a completion date set sometime near the end of September; however, tough weather during the spring, summer and fall months has pushed the timeline on the project back just a few months.
“It’s been business as usual though,” said Diminick in an interview with The Daily Herald last month. “We hoped to be in there by now, but our operations are continuing to run smoothly without it.”
After the fire, New Pig decided to rent warehousing space in Juniata for its products. This was an additional expense that New Pig said PENAC was responsible for because of the injunction.
The new building will be used strictly for warehouse space. Non-warehouse working employees who once held office space in Building No. 2 are now set up in the former C-COR building.
The measurements of the warehouse equal 350-feet by 350-feet. Inside, there is 122,500 square feet of space. Diminick said the building was designed to allow for expansion. Another 43,750 square feet can be expanded to the north and 35,000 square feet can be expanded south.
Diminick added that an advantage of the new building is that it is connected directly to the manufacturing building.
“Before the fire, anything that needed to be taken from manufacturing to the warehouse would have to have been loaded on trucks then moved 250 feet to the warehouse,” he said. “It wasn’t a big deal to move all that, but we’re sure going to save some time now.”
According to the web site, since 1985, New Pig has been providing innovative products and services to industrial, institutional and governmental facilities. The company has grown into a multi-channel, multi-brand supplier of products designed specifically for liquid management, industrial safety and plant maintenance.
It is committed to helping workplaces worldwide get clean – and stay clean. Today, New Pig serves more than 170,000 customers in more than 40 countries.
