Residents of small Missouri town forced to evacuate after EV battery recycling facility catches fire

A fire at a battery recycler resulted in the forced evacuation of residents near a small town in southeast Missouri. 

A Fox News affiliate reported that a fire Wednesday afternoon at Critical Mineral Recovery in Fredericktown, Missouri, released toxic smoke stretching miles north of the town. A Facebook page for the Madison County emergency services posted an emergency evacuation order on Wednesday. 

“Per the Madison County Sheriffs Office EVERYONE North and North West of the village creek road and Madison 217 are needs to Evacuate IMMEDIATELY!” the post stated. 

A modeling map posted on the Fredericktown Fire Department Facebook page shows a smoke plume extending more than a dozen miles north of the town of less than 4,500 residents. The department warned citizens who aren’t in the evacuation zone to shelter in place indoors, close windows and turn off air conditioning systems. 

As of Thursday morning, the department had issued no further updates on its social media page.

According to the Missouri Independent, the facility is one of the world’s largest lithium-ion battery recycling plants in the world. The company’s website, which was down Thursday morning, claims the facility has “the most sophisticated automated and remote supervised and controlled fire suppression systems in the world.”

“The state-of-the-art fire prevention system is designed to detect fires before they start. The system covers all areas where battery materials are stored or processed. It is monitored remotely 24/7 employing high-intensity industrial forward looking infrared…camera technology,” the website states, according to the Independent.