RUMFORD – A MeadWestvaco paper mill crew worked through the overnight under bright lights mounted on poles to clean up debris from Tuesday’s building collapse and fire.

Officials were still assessing damages and necessary repairs Wednesday. They didn’t know how costly Tuesday’s events were, said spokesman Steve Hudson.

“We are in the process of just continuing to get back to normal,” he said late Wednesday afternoon.

“Hopefully, we’ll be back to normal in a couple of days,” he added.

Throughout Wednesday, crews worked to clear lingering wisps of smoke, mainly from office areas and other buildings near the destroyed 100-year-old maintenance office building.

“We’re just buttoning up the mill today, and making sure that our air systems can handle it, and that we don’t have cold air exposed. But all the machines are up and running pretty well today,” Hudson said.

One machine was shut down Wednesday for a scheduled outage, but that work “seems to be going OK,” he added.

On the firefighting end of things, Rumford’s 1979 American Lafrance pumper truck was placed back in service Wednesday after firefighters thawed the ice out of it.

They were still thawing and cleaning other equipment used to fight the four-alarm fire.

Deputy Chief Benjamin Byam said firefighters had to tow the inoperable pumper back to the station Tuesday afternoon after its transmission froze in pump gear, a casualty of high winds and low temperatures and subzero wind chills.

“The truck has since been thawed out, and placed back in service with no damage found from the icing,” said firefighter Scott Holmes.

As for the cause and origin of the fire that incinerated the building’s interior, it may never be known due to the amount of damage caused when the building collapsed then burned, said Chief John Woulfe.

Tuesday afternoon, a state Fire Marshal’s Office representative and Rumford fire investigators determined that an apparent buildup of ice on the building that was located between the mill’s No. 15 and No. 9 complexes caused part of the roof and walls to collapse.

Two employees were treated for smoke inhalation and released from Rumford Hospital. No firefighters or mill rescue crews were injured.

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