SOUDAN MINE— Local firefighters responded here on Tuesday to a fire in the engine house at the Lake Vermilion-Soudan Underground Mine State Park that sent one park employee to the hospital with minor smoke inhalation. Two other workers were examined on scene by personnel from the Tower Ambulance.
According to park manager Jim Essig, the fire started in an attic area adjacent to the engine room, which contains and powers the enormous cable spool that operates the mine’s main hoist. A worker at the site reported seeing flames and smoke in the attic space, which was difficult to access.
The fire appears to have been caused by heat buildup in a cast metal grid that’s designed to absorb heat generated during the operation of the hoist, particularly at slower speeds.
Adding to the challenge was the fact that park officials wanted the fire extinguished without the use of water, which they feared could break the metal grid, which is brittle and could crack if it was subjected to rapid cooling. In the end, the firefighters covered the grid with a tarp before extinguishing some of the nearby wood that was still smoldering.
While the engine house is primarily brick and highly resistant to fire, an attic floor that had been installed a number of years ago is made of wood and could have generated a larger fire. In addition, the roof of the building is supported by very large and dry wooden timbers, which could catch fire as well, creating the potential for roof collapse.
But the prompt response by the Breitung, Tower, and Greenwood fire departments helped to keep the fire under control.
Park staff were using the engine and the hoist at the time of the fire, as they were replacing one of the immense metal cables that operate the century-old hoist.
Tuesday’s fire was the second significant fire at the park in the past 13 years. Wood timbers near the bottom of the mine shaft caught fire in March 2011 and resulted in the suspension of underground mine tours until the following year. The underground tours were suspended eight years later due to the COVID pandemic and had not yet reopened as the park took the closure as an opportunity to make long-term improvements to the mine shaft itself.
The underground tours were scheduled to begin again next month, for the first time in several years, so the engine house fire initially raised concerns that those tours could once again be suspended. But the damage proved to be minimal and will not affect plans to begin underground tours again next month.
In addition to the three local fire departments, the Tower Area Ambulance Service responded to the scene for medical backup and subsequently transported the injured individual to the hospital.