A fire, likely caused by a person or persons, started among timber pilings early this morning on the former Rayonier pulp mill site, 2 miles east of downtown, authorities said.
“We’re assuming it was a campfire” that started the blaze, said Randy Boston, the contract caretaker for the abandoned 75-acre parcel owned by Jacksonville, Fla.-based Rayonier Advanced Materials. “Over the last 10 years, we’ve had the homeless camp issue, and we are dealing with that on a pretty regular basis,” he said. “It’s gotten really worse in about the last three years.”
The fire originated under a concrete slab that was the floor of the pulp mill’s finishing room warehouse that lies just east of an abandoned 4-acre dock, Boston said.
There were no injuries.