The fire at Palm Paper’s factory started at about 2.10pm last Friday (7 October).
It was confined to a small area in the processing plant but crews remained at the scene all weekend and a spokeswoman for Norfolk County Council confirmed to PrintWeek there is still one engine present there today (10 October).
Staff were evacuated from the factory in the Saddlebow industrial estate and it was shut down almost immediately after the fire began. It's unclear if paper production has since resumed at the plant.
The cause of the fire is currently unknown but the East of England ambulance service confirmed one person was taken to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, King's Lynn, suffering from smoke inhalation. The ambulance service’s hazardous area response team also attended as a precaution.
In a statement, Norfolk Fire and Rescue Service west area manager James Belcher said: "On Friday afternoon, more than 80 firefighters from Norfolk Fire and Rescue Service, using 10 fire engines as well as specialist appliances, dealt with a large fire that had broken out inside the Palm Paper mill at Saddlebow, which is just outside King’s Lynn in West Norfolk.
"The fire and rescue service brought the fire under control by early evening but crews remained on site over the weekend to continue to damp down and maintain a watching brief.
“One appliance will remain on site at Palm Paper for the rest of today (Monday) and fire investigators will work with the company to identify the cause of the fire.”
Palm Paper is the sister company of Cheshire-based Palm Recycling and is the biggest buyer of paper fibre material collected on behalf of Palm Recycling’s clients.
It produces around 450,000 tonnes of newsprint per year and supplies paper for a number of regional and national newspaper publishers.
Palm Paper supplies the paper used by its local newspaper the Eastern Daily Press (EDP), but the EDP confirmed that the blaze had not affected supplies.
An 18-second YouTube video showing the blaze emerged on Sunday.
Palm Paper was unavailable for comment.
