Hilo business devastated by malicious fire

By PETER SUR

Tribune-Herald staff writer

The heat from the fire was so intense that an empty 85-gallon metal tank expanded and exploded with unimaginable force.

From where it sat amid the fiery carnage on the morning of May 30 in a Shipman Business Park warehouse, the mangled remains of the superheated tank shot into the air, through the weakened second-story metal roof and arced onto Kipimana Street. The tank left a skylight in its wake.

The 12,000-square-foot Reliance Water Tanks warehouse still stands, but there’s little worth salvaging from the 60 or 70 water tanks, machinery and tons of raw material that used to be inside. The maliciously set fire caused more than $1 million in damage.

There’s a reward of at least $15,000 for any information that can lead to an arrest of the suspects involved, said Tony Persson, general manager of WaterWorks, which is a customer of Reliance Water Tanks.

Both WaterWorks and Reliance are owned by Verne Wood, who started his business as Puna Water Services some 25 years ago. Reliance was building and exporting water tanks throughout the state, and had plans to expand to the mainland.

Nobody knows how long the warehouse had been burning, but the first calls came in around 5:19 a.m., shortly after the tank exploded.

“When we pulled up to the scene, there was heavy black smoke coming from all window areas,” said Keaau Fire Station Capt. Keith La‘eha. The
firefighters first trained their hoses into the warehouse from one of the rear sliding bay doors that had been left open. When the fire was extinguished, the scene was turned over to police, who investigated for a week and released the building to its owners Thursday.

Persson gave a tour of the building and showed the aftermath of the fire, which ravaged a second-floor office, a $100,000 machine and tons of raw materials. The building is insured, but it’s a total loss.

According to Persson, he was told by investigators that a vehicle was seen at the building around 1 a.m., possibly to drop off the burglars. The property is surrounded by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire, but someone was able to cut the lock with bolt cutters.

Black marks on the door frame show evidence of an attempted forced opening. Prying the door didn’t work, but they were able to cut a 6-inch diameter hole in the metal wall — enough for someone to stick an arm through the hole and open the door from the inside.

The door had a large sign that read “Notice: All activity monitored by video camera,” but the burglars were undeterred.

Once inside, they opened the sliding bay doors and loaded tools, tanks and an unknown number of other things onto a company vehicle, a green 2003 Ford F-350 flatbed truck. Somebody poured an accelerant over warehouse pallets and other materials, and set it alight.

The truck, with its license plate 670 HDE, remains missing.

The six or seven employees who worked full-time at the warehouse will help with the cleanup, but layoffs are inevitable until the building is rebuilt.

“I’m hoping to be able to save the (concrete) slab that it’s on,” Persson said.

There were probably 50 or 60 water tanks in the warehouse and materials for tank liners, Persson said.

As for who did it, Persson said he has “no idea.”

“I don’t have any outstanding issues with customers,” he said. Persson believes it was either someone who had a grudge against Wood or someone who wanted to put the company out of business.

The insurance company hired its own forensic investigator to look into the fire, and Police Detective Grant Todd was assigned to the case. Todd could not be reached for comment.

For Persson, last week’s fire was an uncomfortable reminder of a fire that started when he was manager of the OfficeMax store in Hilo in December 2004. The cause of that fire was traced to a spontaneously combusting cell phone battery in a pallet of inkjet cartridges while Persson was out of state on vacation.

The warehouse was built in 2008; it had a small showroom in the front and a workshop in the back. The upstairs floors held two commercial sewing machines and office space. All of this has been destroyed, Persson said.

WaterWorks will remain open. Persson said the company may have to import tanks in the meantime; Wood, the owner, isn’t sure.

“Every day is a little more difficult as I digest the ramifications of it all,” Wood said. “I’m worried about my employees.”

“This was kind of like my dream. Twenty-five years in the business,” he said.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

Email Peter Sur at psur@hawaiitribune-herald.com.