OMAK, Wash. — A live video posted on Facebook by Okanogan County Emergency Management on Tuesday shows the partial collapse on an old lumber mill in Omak as a large fire burns in the area.
An emergency management official who spoke during the Facebook Live said the fire was "very hot," and embers and debris were flying. Firefighters were unable to attack the blaze due to danger from the debris.
The Facebook Live video was posted at about noon on Tuesday.
According to the emergency management official, the fire at the old mill sparked due to the Cold Springs Fire and the rekindling of a previous fire that sparked on July 18. Both fires had merged together, he said.
The Cold Springs Fire has burned approximately 140,000 acres since Sunday, Sept. 6 and is 0% contained at last check.
The video shows a roof in the center of the old lumber mill collapsing and what appear to be fire tornadoes moving across the ground nearby. More of the building also begins to collapse later on in the video.
Colville Tribal Federal Corp., the company that owned Omak Wood Products, said in late 2015 that it would close the mill due to the loss of a major customer, wildfires and falling plywood prices, the Associated Press reported.
Windy conditions around the Inland Northwest sparked more than a dozen wildfires over Labor weekend. Hundreds of thousands of acres are still burning in eastern and central Washington and North Idaho on Tuesday.
According to a tweet from Washington Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz, there are nine large fires burning in Washington state as of Tuesday morning. There have been 58 new wildfires in the last 24 hours alone.