ALIQUIPPA, Pa. --
A hazmat team is responding to a large junkyard fire Monday morning in Aliquippa, Beaver County.
At least a dozen fire companies were called to the scene on Steel Street, where large piles of scrap metal and junk cars were burning.
Aliquippa police Officer Kenneth Watkins said there were "flames about 30 to 40 feet in the air. When my other partners got down here, they could see it coming through the tunnel down Franklin Avenue. It was going pretty good when they got on scene down there."
Channel 4 Action News' Janelle Hall reported than an Aliquippa police officer spotted the flames at Aliquippa Recycling at 2 a.m.
"My house is mortgaged to run the business, so I got up quick and got down here," said owner Ramo Bazzoli.
Hall reported that 75 cars were burned in the fire.
"It's just a pile of cars that were here for recycling. And the tires and plastic were still in the cars and that's what was burning," said Aliquippa Fire Department Chief David Foringer. "It's a scrap yard. He really didn't lose a whole lot as far as inventory. The metal is still there. He'll be able to scrap that."
But Foringer said finding a cause for the fire will be difficult.
"For us to try to figure out where the cause was, where the ignition point was in over 200 cars, it's just not going to happen," said Foringer.
No injuries have been reported.
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