A large-scale fire hits a soybean silo in the South of Rio Grande do Sul

A large fire broke out on Saturday (11) at one of the grain silos of a company located on the margins of BR-116, near the entrance to Arroio Grande, in the South of Rio Grande do Sul. The focus of the fire is silo number three of the Cotribá company complex, which stores around 120 tons of soybeans. The smoke can be seen from the highway. The flames began in the morning and mobilized teams from the Jaguarão Fire Department and the Civil and Auxiliary Fire Service (SCAB), a volunteer firefighter group from Arroio Grande. Firefighters from the company itself are also working to combat the fire, using the internal hydrants of the structure. According to information from the firefighters, the main hypothesis for the origin of the fire is the friction between the soybean grains themselves, which can cause spontaneous combustion, a known risk in agricultural storage structures. High temperatures prevented the side of the silo from being opened, as initially planned in the protocol. The ...