A JOINT police and fire service investigation is continuing into a fire that struck a Witham factory in the early hours of this morning.
Amtek Aluminium in Freebornes Road had to be evacuated at around 4.30am when a blaze tore through its shop blasting area.
At 4,35 am the incident commander reported that the fire had already penetrated the roof and walls and attempts were being made to shut down electricity to the plant.
Derek Shaughnessy, operations director, said: "It's going to take a few hours to get us up and running, clearing the water is the biggest obstacle at the moment, but we should we the machines up and running pretty soon.
"Some of our other ones are already going and we'll just ramp up their production in the meantime.
"We can't thank the fire service enough with how they've dealt with the situation, the strike has not had an impact on our fire.
"Health and safety of the business is paramount and we are cooperating above and beyond with the fire brigade.
The factory has many large interlinked sections of an industrial unit that measures 100m by 50m.
The fire was extinguished by 7am and an investigation was launched into the cause of the blaze.
A spokesman for Amtek said: "There has been a minor fire at the Amtek plant in Witham. The alarm was raised in the early hours of Friday morning and the Fire Brigade was called, the firefighters proceeded to extinguish the fire and the plant was re-opened at around 8am this morning.
"There were no injuries and staff are now preparing the plant for production which will resume later this morning."
