Fire Kills 1,000 Pigs in Iowa Confinement

Feb. 03--COLUMBUS JUNCTION -- About 1,000 pigs were killed during a Friday afternoon fire that destroyed two farrowing houses at the Mipa Hog Farms confinement 10 miles west of Columbus Junction on County Road X17.

Columbus Junction Fire Chief Lynn Mincer said the cleanup of the pigs will be left to owner and operator Mike Braun and Tri-Oak Foods of Oakville, which contracts their pigs through Braun's operation. Though Braun didn't want to comment on the fire, he did say it is too early to determine how the dead pigs will be disposed of.

Though the collapsed buildings still were smoking Saturday, Mincer said there is no worry of the fire starting back up again.

"The buildings are covered in tin, and there is some burning and smoldering going on underneath these buildings," Mincer said Saturday morning.

The Mipa Hog Farms complex consists of eight interconnected buildings spread over 20 acres, and the fire quickly spread from one building to the other. The Columbus Junction Fire Department received the call at 12:53 p.m. Friday, and by the time firefighters arrived, the two buildings were fully engulfed. Mutual aid from fire departments in Columbus Junction, Conesville, Wapello, Grandview and Ainsworth was called in, resulting in more than 45 firefighters. The smoke could be seen from as far away as Muscatine and Iowa City.

The extremely cold weather made fighting the fire all the more difficult, but the firefighters still were able to save six of the eight buildings.

"We had problems with valves freezing up and water damage," Mincer said.

Braun said about 500 to 600 of the pigs killed were sows, while the rest were piglets. The facility had a total of about 5,600 pigs before the fire. Tri-Oaks Foods has contracted their pigs through Braun since 1999.

The cause of the fire is unknown and still is under investigation.

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