The fire that erupted at the DSI Samson Group rubber factory in Bogahagoda, Galle, on Saturday has not affected the manufacturing facility’s key machinery, an official said. 

“The damage was limited to a small warehouse. We move semi-finished products there. We lost 2-3 days of work in progress,” DSI Group Managing Director Kulatunga Rajapaksa told Mirror Business.

He said that a ‘few million’ rupees in unfinished products and a part of the roof were destroyed, and some electronic equipment may have been damaged, but that all were insured.

The facility manufactures rubber sealing rings placed in the lids of small containers such as jam jars, and exports the products for foreign use, Rajapaksa said.
Rajapaksa noted that the facility has the capacity to manufacture 2-3 million sealing rings a month, and that the main machinery was not affected.

However, the cause of the fire is not yet clear. Early police reports after the fire was doused in the facility near Koggala suspected an electrical leak as the cause.

“We do not know the cause. We can’t say definitely that it was an electrical leak, because the power had been switched off. We’re still investigating what happened,” Rajapaksa said.

He said that the company would also wait till the government analyst presents its findings tomorrow.

There were no casualties, and only security guards and drivers were present at the premises when the situation arose.

“Unfortunately, the fire had got too big when they found out, else they would have put it out. It was a fairly big fire. Since it is rubber, the smoke was fairly high. Most of the villages who came there removed the material which could have escalated it,” Rajapaksa added.