Milking operations suspended WHILE CREWS were at the dairy, the Iola Fire Department received a second fire alarm shortly after midnight at Super 8 Motel.
Late Tuesday night flames erupted from the main milking barn at Strickler Dairy north of Iola and quickly consumed the roof and caused damage throughout.
“It took the top off the barn,” said Steve Strickler, owner, this morning.
Jeanette Ingle, an employee at the dairy, was herding up a group of cattle at about 11 p.m. Tuesday when she saw the smoke and flames emanating from the barn.
She alerted coworker Elder Vasquez, who was in the barn with about 100 dairy cows.
“I don’t think he believed me at first,” she said. “He thought I was joking. I started yelling at him to get out.”
Elder, Ingle and the cattle were removed from the barn without injury.
Milking operations for the 350 head of cattle have been suspended. The dairies of Gary Foster in Uniontown and Robert Lowe in Prescott, Mo., have been secured to relieve the cows of their milk, Strickler said.
“The poor cows,” he said. “This is very hard on them to go through the fire and now to transport them. They won’t produce milk as they should.”
Strickler said the going price for milk “is not high enough” to make milk production very profitable. “The price of peat has been so high, and the price of milk so low, it’s been tough,” he said.
And now with the fire, “We’re losing money every day,” he said.
Strickler said it’s too soon to know the immediate future of the dairy.
“In a best case scenario, chances are we could be milking within a week,” he said.
Iola firefighters were on the scene for about five hours in the freezing temperatures to battle the blaze before it could spread.
Members of the Allen County Volunteer Fire Department also assisted.
The call was due to a malfunctioning fire alarm, firefighters said. There was no fire.
FIRE DAMAGES STRICKLER DAIRY
