Firefighters battle out-of-control blaze at NSW feed mill

Dozens of firefighters are battling an intense fire at a feed mill near Newcastle in New South Wales.

Crews were called to the blaze at a Cardiff feed mill on Nelson Rd just after 10am, and up to 50 firefighters are working with engineers onsite to extinguish the blaze. 

The fire started in a dust control vent and spread to the exhaust ducts.

The temperature inside the feed mill has reached 500 degrees Celsius.

Workers evacuated

Fire and Rescue NSW's zone commander for the Lower Hunter James Manuao said crews responded to an automatic fire alarm just after 10am.

There were four people on site when they arrived and firefighters moved them to safety. 

"We located a small fire at the top of the dust extraction system," Mr Manuao said. 

"Due to good work from our firies, they've managed to get onto that fast, they've attacked that and doused that fire."

Mr Manuao said they were concerned about the heat going down through the ducting system to where the grain grinder was located. 

"We're methodically going through the plumbing and the piping system to attack that fire, aiming to get down through to the bottom, where the grinder is, and see where it is," he said. 

"We're monitoring that temperature, it isn't increasing anymore."

Mr Manuao said the original fire reached temperatures above 200 degrees Celsius, while the temperature near the grinder, which crews had not reached yet, was about 500C.

"We are concerned there is fire still propagating down the bottom. We are slowly working our way through this, we are maintaining our safety, we've got exclusion zones in place, we will have this under control in a few hours," he said. 

Mr Manuao said they were monitoring the welfare of crews and regularly swapping people out. 

"This is going to be a long and arduous job today, but the firies are up to it," he said. 

The incident commander said all the stormwater drains in the area had been shut off to ensure no runoff went into the environment. 

Mr Manuano said they were keeping the Environmental Protection Authority up to date with what was occurring. 

He said at this stage, firefighters believed the blaze had not spread to other silos on the site. 

"It's way too early to understand [how it started]," Mr Manuao said. 

"Right now our primary thing is getting the fire out, maintaining safety," he said. 

"We are discussing with the site manager what we're doing because we want to be able to get this plant up and going as soon as possible.

"We don't want to cause more damage than the fire has, so we're trying to look at what is the best way to put the fire out." 

Smoke can no longer be seen from the street. 

Residents smell smoke

Penny Hargrave, who lives above the Cardiff industrial estate, said her son was outside when the fire started and saw the smoke. 

"It was a shock to see all the big white plumes smoke coming out there," she said. 

Ms Hargrave said the smoke had died down, but every now and then some was still visible. 

"It's definitely calmed down now to what it was," she said. 

"We're lucky we're out of the wind direction."