Employees and dairy cows escaped harm when a fire broke out the morning of Feb. 8 in a loafing barn at the South Dakota State University Dairy Research and Training Facility.

According to a statement from the Brookings County Sheriff’s Department, a call came in at 8:06 a.m. that there was a fire at the facility located 1.5 miles north of the Brookings campus. In addition to the sheriff’s department, the SDSU police department, Brookings Fire Department, Volga Fire Department and a Brookings ambulance responded.

Before emergency personnel arrived, barn staff were able to safely evacuate the building, as well as begin removing about 130 head of dairy cows. “Upon arrival [of emergency personnel], flames were visible from the north side of the building,” says Assistant Sheriff Scott Sebring.

Sebring says fire crews were able to extinguish the flames once all the cattle had been removed, and a report from the Brookings Register says fire crews were on the scene until about 11 a.m. Sebring says the fire appears to have started in a manure pumping room before spreading to other parts of the barn. The extent of total damage is unknown at this point.

The Dairy Research and Training Facility is used as a teaching laboratory for undergraduate and graduate students, and for adult and continuing education. It also provides opportunity for research for Dairy and Food Science faculty and students. The facility produces all of the milk that is processed at the SDSU Dairy Plant.

This is an ongoing story and contained the full extent of information known at time of publishing.