On February 17th, 2025, a massive fire erupted at SPS Technologies manufacturing plant in Abington. The fire, which took over five days to extinguish, caused shelter-in-place orders and panic across the township.
One SCH parent was on the ground to fight it.
David Schwartz, father of Tobey ’27 and Emma ’25, has been a volunteer firefighter at Lamott Fire Company in Cheltenham Township since 2001.
At 9:43 PM, the first fire company arrived at SPS Technologies. They reported an “active fire breaching through the roof of the building, accompanied by multiple explosions,” according to the Abington press release. David Schwartz’s fire company arrived quickly after.
“We were dispatched on the third alarm,” said Schwartz. “Probably within ten minutes of the initial fire.” Schwartz’s crew responded with a fire engine and worked to supply water to two ladder companies. During fires, ‘engine companies’ work to extinguish the fire with water, while ‘ladder companies’ focus on fire ventilation and search and rescue. “The incident was what we call a ‘defensive operation,’” he said. “We were just trying to flow enough water to contain the fire, minimize it from spreading.”
The ladder crews, on the other hand, first focused on searching for trapped employees.
“There were reports very early on of potentially up to sixty people trapped, so we had to initiate a search,” he said. Schwartz extolled the bravery of the search and rescue teams, pointing to low visibility and dangerous conditions.
“Thankfully they didn’t have to stay in there too long because the employees were reported safe pretty quickly.”
The SPS Technologies factory fabricated aerospace-grade fasteners and other materials. The complex manufacturing processes for these products uses toxic chemicals like trichloroethylene, vinyl chloride, and 1-2 dichloroethane products. Schwartz mentioned that SPS company scientists helped advise firefighters how to best contain these toxic chemicals.
Thankfully, the fire did not appear to reach the majority of the chemical storage tanks. Air and water monitoring around Abington have not shown any large concentrations of dangerous chemicals.
Firefighters had been planning for a fire at the 500,000 square foot complex for years. Firefighters often do what’s called “preplanning” for high-risk buildings. Schwartz said, “you take your significant hazards, special critical infrastructure, and you take time to go to those sites, you map them out, you understand what the facility looks like.” In SPS’s case, they “thought about the size of it, what chemicals are stored on site? Where can you get access? Where do you have water supply access?” It’s essential for firefighters to know these facts before they attack a large-scale industrial fire.
Despite this, Schwartz declared, “no amount of planning prepared anybody for this one. This one was a fire for the ages.”
Despite the fire’s scale and the potential danger posed by toxic chemicals, Schwartz believes that the weather conditions were the hardest part of fighting the fire. When asked about the conditions, he had one word to describe it. “Brutal.”
Temperatures while at SPS technologies dropped into the low twenties the night of the fire. Schwartz said, “We’re there from like 9:45 at night until 8 AM the next morning, and everything becomes a sheet of ice.” The water his company used to douse the flames froze inside hoses.
“The truck is covered in ice, the street is covered in ice, and you’re covered in ice.”
The cause of the fire at SPS technologies is still under investigation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives.
