Fire at Southhampton Uni does not dampen Innos
A major fire on Sunday morning partially destroyed the Mountbatten Building at Southhampton University, in particular the area containing the microfabrication facility. Very fortunately, as far as can be ascertained, no one was injured or is missing as a result of the fire.
The Mountbatten Building houses research laboratories and offices for the Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC) and the School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS). The emergency services were alerted to the fire when the alarms were activated at 6.30am Sunday, and the fire was under control by mid-afternoon. Based on available information there was nothing in the smoke plume that would pose a significant risk to health beyond that of the normal constituents of any other building fire. The cause of the fire is not yet known.
The Universitys Secretary and Registrar John Lauwerys commented: ‘This is a huge loss to the University and the fire has destroyed one of our key research facilities of international importance, supporting groups in both Electronics and Computer Science and the Optoelectronics Research Centre.
‘It is a huge relief that no one has been injured as a result of the fire and our concern now is to ensure that staff and students that normally work in the Mountbatten Building are given every help to re-establish their academic work.
‘It is not yet safe to enter the Mountbatten Building, so we do not yet know the extent of the loss in terms of peoples research material. It is likely to be a few days before this can be fully established, he added.
Andrew Monk, CEO of Innos released a statement on Monday outlining the impact on Innos. The statement reads as follows:
It has been widely reported today that there was a fire at the University of Southamptons Mountbatten Building on Sunday 30th October 2005. At this time I would like to reassure all associated with Innos that we have procedures in place to ensure that, despite the severity of the incident, Innos remains fully operational.
Our headquarters at the adjacent Gower Building were unaffected by the fire. The skills and expertise that has established Innos as the UKs leading research and development company, delivering expertise in silicon, MEMS and nanotechnologies remain unaffected.
It is clear the effects of the blaze upon our cleanroom and equipment, that was housed in the Mountbatten Building, has had a major impact on our ability to complete processing and production from this site. However we have been quick to implement emergency procedures and are working closely with cleanrooms across the UK to transfer existing and new projects to these facilities, whilst the full situation is assessed.
I would like to thank the team at Innos, the University of Southampton and the emergency services for their continual support during this time. We will be speaking with all of our customers over the next few days to ensure that everyone is kept fully informed of events.
