We’re fundraising to support the newsroom this spring. But on this page let’s take a break. Here are some efforts raising funds to support victims of the Searsmont fire. We hope you’ll consider a gift to support the families.
Andrew Cross’ friends and family said a final goodbye to the fallen Morrill firefighter on Friday, a week after he was killed in a fire and explosion at the Robbins Lumber mill in Searsmont.
Fire trucks from Belfast and Liberty extended their ladders on either side of Route 131 with an enormous American flag suspended between them. Around 1 p.m., a police procession passed beneath the flag, escorting a hearse to the Veracity Chapel from a Belfast funeral home.
Firefighters saluted and a bagpiper played as an urn containing Cross’ remains were carried into the chapel.
Hundreds of people attended the funeral, including firefighters from surrounding towns and U.S. Sen. Susan Collins. It was a more intimate gathering than the public memorial held Thursday evening that drew visitors and first responders from across New England.
Lincolnville firefighter Aaron Heald, who was injured in the fire, was in attendance with his department, his hands still wrapped in large bandages.
The fire, which erupted on the morning of May 15, injured at least twelve people, including first responders, a mill worker and two of the company’s owners. Eight people remain hospitalized in burn units at MaineHealth Maine Medical Center in Portland and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
A few hundred yards away from the chapel, at the Morrill Volunteer Fire Department station, stood a memorial to Cross, 27, who was also a machinist at Bath Iron Works and owned his own trucking company.
Over the week, the fire station shrine gradually grew to include a framed photo of Cross in his bunker gear, a tin with patches from several other departments that had come to pay their respects, dozens of bouquets and a copy of the Fireman’s Prayer.
Ten miles away, at the Searsmont lumber mill, two cranes towered above the Robbins Lumber yard on Friday, where state and federal officials continue to comb through sawdust and debris — both by hand and with heavy equipment — trying to reconstruct the blaze. On the day of the fire, a company official said it appeared to have started in an area where wood shavings are bagged and then spread to a silo full of shavings which exploded.
The cranes will be used to lift the remains of the silo to continue investigations, according to the state fire marshal’s office.
