A Follow Up on The Eduard Fire – Some Better News!
Having posted on the fire at the Eduard Warehouse a day or two ago I'm pleased to be able to follow up with the text and a photo from a media post from earlier today:
Dear friends, thank you again for your messages and support!
Yesterday we completed the reconnaissance of our premises and prepared for today's evacuation of undamaged goods from the warehouse. It still looks like it will be possible to save about 80%. The rest remains in the warehouse and will get new boxes in packaging compartment. The evacuated goods will be moved to a nearby hall, where they will wait until new space is available for the temporary location of the sales department. We have several offers, they will be evaluated on Wednesday. I assume that preparations for the move will begin immediately on December 28, and perhaps the move to selected areas will begin in the last week of the year. My plan is to start selling no later than January 15th.
The department providing packaging, including stored components, is intact and ready for action. In this part of building we found also moldings for the Tornado, which I originally mistakenly declared destroyed. So there will be a Tornado with pin up posters.
The January INFO will be released on Tuesday, January 5. I have to rework the editorial a bit, but I'll make it.
Happy Modelling!
Vladimir Sulc,
CEO, Eduard – Model Accessories
This is of course fantastic news - the photo shows loads of stored aftermarket accessories basically untouched!
Roll on mid January!
Great news. Looks like jobs for the employees are safe. Happy Xmas for them all, hopefully.
Vladimir: Thanks for the great news. Eduard will rise again!
Merry Christmas, from California!
Great news indeed!
That is great news , I've dealt with them in the past and they couldn't have been more helpful .I'm sure the team at Eduard will rise to the challenge and come out on top.
N
Paul, @yellow10
I am very happy to hear this news. It is indeed wonderful...
The main thing is that no one lost their life, and that the business has plans to salvage what they can. More often than not, most businesses fail shortly after a fire happens. It seems that Eduard has escaped this fate. Thank God for that.
I'm a retired firefighter, and have seen my share of damage that a structure fire can do to a persons property first hand. I salute the fire fighters who were on scene here. By the looks of things, they did an outstanding job.
I know for sure that I will be making a few more Eduard purchases after Christmas / New Year. Those new tool Spitfire, Mustang, Bf-109 and Fw-190 kits sure do look good in the box. I'm anxious to start building one... 🙂
Hey Louis, I saw video
Of the firefighters at work they seemed to be keeping the end of the building that wasn’t burning wet, while fighting the fire at the other end. From the picture attached the part of the building they were keeping wet seems to have been the part where that undamaged stock is. Perhaps I’m reading too much into that?
I started looking at the stash yesterday - I haven’t bought an Eduard kit or a while but I do have plenty to build. I think a Spit Mk2 and an Fw190 have my name on them!
Paul, @yellow10
I would believe that your observations are spot on about the fire. Plastics, rubber, carpet and anything that is made from a petroleum based product gives off a horribly thick, nasty, black smoke as a byproduct of incomplete combustion. Typically this is what causes the majority of smoke damages in a structure fire. You also don't want to breathe this stuff in as it is extremely harmful to you. They have determined there are over 2,000 different toxins present in smoke of this type. Most of them are cancer causing too. It can be absorbed into your skin easily, especially when you are wet with sweat...and your skin pores are open. (Like a firefighter is when wearing turnout gear).
Many firefighter's retire, only later to succumb to some form of cancer. I pray every day I do not end up in this category. I pray to God that he protects me now, as he did when I was on duty. I have had numerous "close calls"... more than I care to remember. Had I been using a cat with nine lives in place of me, I should be on cat number 7 or 8 by now... 🙂
As far as how the firefighters approached this fire, that too is a classic textbook example... and these firefighters should be praised for their exemplary work.
Make an aggressive interior attack, knocking down the flames and increasing the chances of survival should there be a victim inside. At the same time, have another crew taking care of "exposures" such as what the crew was doing with keeping the other part of the building wet. There would have been a ventilation team too. Their job would be to open the building up to allow the heat and smoke out, once the interior fire attack was started.
The goal is to push the fire and smoke out of the building away from the areas that are not yet damaged. Most of the time an open window or door is used for this purpose. Other times we used a hole in the roof to allow the heat and smoke out of the building. The closer this hole is to the seat of the fire, the better the outcome... usually.
Quite often the heat from the fire will evaporate the water coming from the nozzle, before it actually makes contact with any surface inside a building that is burning. Keep in mind that a typical house fire can have temperatures that exceed 1200 degrees F. It gets even hotter if it has a higher fuel load, such as what the Eduard building would have had with all the plastic inside it. Now think about how hot your oven gets when you are cooking something inside at 350 degrees F. This water evaporation process is especially true when the crew is using what we call a "Fog" nozzle. A fog nozzle makes many small finer droplets of water. It is adjustable and has several uses. This is why it is commonly used.
For deep seated fires, a nozzle with a smooth bore tip will deliver larger droplets of water to the seat of a fire, and it will have a faster knockdown. But most fire companies run with a fog nozzle at the end of their hose lines, because it is more versatile and can be used for other things, such as hydraulic ventilation, and can be opened from a straight water stream to a wide fog pattern. This is why they're called "Fog" nozzles.
These crews on scene at the Eduard fire, would have also had a search and rescue crew looking for victims inside the building, and yet another crew on standby outside in case a firefighter was injured inside the burning building, or became trapped or lost inside a fire. These crews are called "R.I.T. crews" Rapid Intervention Team, and they are ready to go inside the building at a moments notice if needed. One thing that most don't realize is this: For a single injured firefighter, on average it takes 6 more firefighters to get the injured person out of the building. Even more are required if more than one person becomes injured or somehow incapacitated.
Keeping all of this "controlled chaos" in check is the job of the Company Officer. I have ran several fire ground scenes where I had over 30 firefighters under my control.
Fighting fire is a science in of itself. No two fires are alike, and I learned something new each time...
I'll join you in some Eduard builds after the New Year rolls around. I have a new tool Eduard Fw-190A2 that is just screaming at me to build it... 😉
Thanks for posting this update for us. Things are looking better.
Louis, thanks for that fantastic insight - I wondered how much of the black smoke was down to the sprues! It’s just brilliant to have an expert here able to comment - again thanks for sharing your experience and learning!
As it says in the press release an elevator maintenance worker had to be treated for smoke inhalation.
Hopefully he/she recovers fully.
Paul, @yellow10
I hope they make a full recovery too... Thanks for posting this update for us. Should you hear anything else, please let us know. Thanks again.
This next update makes your point very well, Louis!
From Eduard:
OUR THANKS TO THE FIREFIGHTERS
In recent days, we have received offers of assistance from individuals, companies and state organizations. We are both very encouraged and appreciative of this support. However, we want to dedicate this message to all the firefighters who intervened in the fire in our warehouse. This was not an easy task and we are aware that some of them also suffered injuries. We greatly appreciate your work want to extend our heartfelt thanks to every one of you. We wish you a speedy recovery and a peaceful and Merry Christmas. Our thanks go to these fire brigades and we hope that our list is complete (see below).
Firefighter Rescue / Professional firefighter units:
HZS of the Usti Region - territorial district of Most
HZS of the Usti Region - Teplice territorial district
HZS Enterprise Unipetrol a.s.
HZS Business North Energy a.s.
Volunteer fire brigades / municipal volunteer firefighter units:
SDH Polio
SDH Most – Rudolice
SDH Bra ňany
SDH Litvinov - municipality
SDH Jellyfish
SDH Upper Jiretin
SDH Mezibo říí
SDH Lom
SDH Grave
Photo: HZS of the Usti Region
What I like about Eduard is that they take the time to inform their customers or fans or hobbyists that the company is made up of people who are trying to make a living while serving the community. No other modeling company that I know of would bother to release photos of things going wrong. They admit to making mistakes . . . at least in developing their products they change and develop things like the Fw-190 kits. Its kind of like following a football team and you can be apart of it by getting their kits. This year has been a pooh show but, at least this is one story that has a bright future.
I think that’s a very apt way to look at Eduard, Stephen. You always feel
they are on your side! Maybe it goes back to them being one of those companies that has grown from small beginnings and still remembers what it is to be a modeller. You get the feeling - a bit like Wingnuts - that they really want to put out outstanding kits because they are passionate about the hobby.
WingNut Wings may it R.I.P.. I was looking forward to seeing their Lancaster. Since Meng released the Fokker triplane. . . they more than likely cut the molds and either bought them or are leasing them from Sr. Peter. Maybe there is a Lancaster in the works.
They say Meng was involved in one other set of molds for WNW. I don’t think it was the Lanc. Others will know better, but there is hope
The Mengnut kit is not without its issues (broken parts due to the position and packing of the sprues in the box, warped upper wing) - but it is still considered the best DR1 out there. I’ll try to build one in 2021.
Here’s hoping for a Lanc!
Paul, @yellow10
The "Mengnut" Dr-1 looks to be a good model, and I still need to get the kit review posted on it. The plastic on mine seems to be OK, but I have not yet built it. Our friend Pedro Rocha has one and it is close to being completed. I would like to include his completed model photos in the review article.
Like you, I agree it would be nice to have the opportunity to build up one of them and hopefully next year is "the" year it gets done. I also want to build up a WNW Albatros DV, Fokker D VII, and Pfalz D III. Maybe when the "Luftwaffe" group build gets going it will happen... time will tell. But first I want to allow some of the other group builds to wind down before starting another one.
Merry Christmas to you and your family. Stay safe.
Glad to hear this news and that the situation wasn't as bad as first thought...
I am so glad it was not a total loss. Good luck with all the work ahead.
Great news indeed. We could use that Eduard's will be ok in a year that has been so negative in many ways away from the modeling hobby world. Will be looking forward to purchasing more products in the upcoming year.
I think we’d all echo that view, Chuck! Thank goodness we can chalk one up for the good guys!
Here is a more detailed report from Vladimir Sulc, Eduard CEO.
(Note that since the Tornado moulds have been found undamaged as he mentions in the statement above).
“Dear friends,
thank you for your support and sympathy. We appreciate it very much!
The fire broke out yesterday in the morning on the second floor of the building, in the storage of plastic sprues. The reason is still unknown, it is probable that there is a fault in the electrical installation. Nothing happened to any of our people, at the time the fire broke out, no one was in the area of the fire from us. Our people were taking an inventory of the sprues there, the fire broke out when they left for a snack. There was also maintenance company working on the elevator in that room, it seems that one of them was intoxicated by smoke and being taken to hospital, so he was the person mentioned in the reports.
The fire destroyed over one million sprues for about 200,000 models. Furthermore, a three-month supply of shipping boxes, the large parcels, various sizes, burned down. The delivery arrived last week.
Fortunately, firefighters managed to keep the fire in this upper floor. It did not get to the second part of the building, that´s newer extension, separated by the wall of the original building and connected to the affected area by two stairways and connecting corridors. Thanks to this, other components for model packaging, instructions, boxes, decals, etchings, masks, etc. have been saved so far. The packaging area is not damaged either, but we will definitely have to leave it.
In packaging part of the building, shipments are also prepared for some Czech shops (MN Modelar, Artur, Pecka, etc.). These are also undamaged. The question now is how do we manage to get them out and send them. We will probably get a crane through the window.
The finished products and sales department are on the floor under the fire area. Surprisingly, there is not much damage there yet, there is also little water that flowed from the upper floor on stairway and on the columns of the hall. Some products are wet, but on a small scale. If we manage to get the goods out and move, I assume that we will be able to save more than we expected. Of course, we need to quickly find other suitable storage and shipping facilities.
Unfortunately, there is a risk of the roof of the building collapsing, where the reinforced concrete structure was obviously damaged. We will see how the structure will behave during its cooling and whether the internal stress will not tear it. And if so, whether the ruins of the roof will fall only within the 2nd floor, or whether it will break through the ceiling of the 1st floor too. I hope it doesn't happen. Keep your fingers crossed! The building is from the beginning of the 20th century, it is obviously robust and structurally oversized. Perhaps it will resist. The commander of fire fighting teams said that if this fire would happen in a modern industrial building, it would burn to the ground.
Thanks to two gentlemen - fire fighter and modeller Josef Choreň and the commander of the units, that they took me to the building after the fire was extinguished. I was able to find out the current state thanks to them. I have to say that it calmed me immensely, really immensely, and lifted my spirits. All day long we shivered so that the fire would not penetrate into other parts of building, to the components of the models etc. I had been personally there since flames whipped from the windows of the 2nd floor and one window after another cracked and shattered glass. I was sure that the finished goods on the first floor were definitely lost, And if it would not be destroyed by fire it will be destroyed by water. Surprisingly, when we walked through these areas, they were either undamaged or with relatively little damage.
As for our sales department, the plan was to close it on Monday or Tuesday next week and start inventories. The plan was to reopen it between January 6 and 8. What will happen now is unclear. We will see if we will be able to save stocks and when and in what way we can resume the activities of the sales department. If everything goes well and in optimal way, it would probably be in the second half of January.
If we could not save the stock from the damaged building, we would temporarily open a sales department in Obrnice. In January, we would sell the January news, to which we would gradually add more items as we renewed and put them back on sale. Then we would move to new premises.
We will have the biggest problem with topping up the models, because we will have to completely restore the stock of plastic sprues. That will be a lot of work. We will go for it from the latest production and we get back against the flow of time, producing gradually older and older items. Unfortunately, the plastic parts purchased externally are gone forever, so Delfins, for example, will not be there unless we make a new purchase. The same is the Tornado, which unfortunately is gone including pin up posters, or the Bf 108 in 1/32. However, the sprues for latter one are available from company in Prague, which can be purchased relatively easily.
Friends from Special Hobby will also be involved in producing of our plastic parts . In SH, they have been producing for us for a long time, and in the afternoon „George“ Šilhánek and „Fredy“ Riedel promised me the allocation of larger production capacity for our needs. We are grateful for that, thank you!
Thanks again for the ideas for our support. We all appreciate it very much in Eduard, really. There is not much you can do for us at this time. In January, when we start again, the best way to help us is with your purchases. The e-shop will now remain closed until we are able to sell again, and until it will be clear what we are able to sell and when we will be able to ship. We will keep you informed about the development of the situation.
Happy Modelling!
Vladimir Sulc,
CEO, Eduard – Model Accessories”
So fingers crossed the structural elements of the building hold out while the stock is saved.
But 200,000 models and over a million sprues is an incredible loss! Hard to imagine.
Credit to the firefighters again for getting this response so right, and to the company for their excellent communication and drive to bounce back fast!
Wow, thanks for the latest updates, Paul. It is neat to see how the likes of SH and surely yet more of the eastern European companies may lend a hand. Eduard in it's own right is a great kit maker/company, but with so many models world-wide being adorned by Eduard product, I have faith that they will get through this with much community support, and a relatively eased strain.
Good thoughts Andrew - I guess by reviving and reboxing some previous kits Eduard are in credit with some companies in terms of good will. Just nice to see the whole thing from a community perspective.
Eduard and Special Hobby go back to both being part of MPM before the Velvet Revolution.
Thanks for the updates Paul. That's even better than my friend at Eduard thought things were like when I e-mailed him over the weekend. Not good news by any means but no disaster. In 2020, that counts as Good News.
Amazing that we take solace from
this event, Tom - but I totally agree. We’d have grabbed this Outcome with both hands when we saw the black smoke billowing out of that building earlier this week.
Now for an effective vaccine and world peace...
Eduard is such a huge part of our hobby. I’m so happy to hear that all is not lost. You guys rock, Vlad!
Thanks for the update, Paul.
Let's hope their recovery will be full and quick!
Fingers crossed!