As a trash pit burns inside, walls coming down to let fire crews in Doral plant

As Miami-Dade County’s trash incinerator burned for the fourth day, firefighting squads were getting closer to the heart of the fire: a massive mound of garbage weighing about 8,000 tons.

On Wednesday, crews had begun the delicate effort to demolish walls enclosing the Doral warehouse that holds the trash on its way to being processed into electricity at the county-owned, privatelyrun facility.

The demolition effort is risky enough that work can only happen while the sun is up, though firefighters will continue battling the blaze around the clock, said Raied “Ray” Jadallah, the county’s Fire Rescue chief.

“We’ve already seen some partial success as a result of removing some of the walls, so we could get our apparatuses to begin extinguishing that fire,” he said at a press conference at the Stephen P. Clark Center in downtown Miami on Wednesday afternoon. “So much so that I know the smoke has subsided over the course of time, but we still have quite a bit of walls that need to be removed.”

The county’s mayor, Daniella Levine Cava, said people living in the area of the plant at 6990 NW 97th Avenue should avoid contact with the smoky air.

While the county says environmental tests show no hazardous materials, Miami-Dade is urging people to stay indoors, run their air conditioners and keep their windows closed while driving. Precautionary alerts went out by text to people living within two miles of the facility.

“Folks in the area should remain indoors as much as possible,” Levine Cava said. “This is the way it would be for any smoke incident.”

Covanta manages the plant for Miami-Dade and uses incinerators to convert trash into electricity.