In December 2014, the Compañía Harinera Nacional (National Flour Company) still carried out its operations in an old factory located in the neighborhood of San Simón Tolnáhuac, a couple of blocks away from the Tlatelolco subway station, in Mexico City. At 11 p.m. on December 4th, the neighbors of the flour factory felt the temperature rising, as smoke and flashes of light seemed to come out of the industrial building. Within minutes, a neighbor captured with his phone camera the shocking view of a burning factory: almost an entire block wide, the Harinera Nacional’s silhouette was framed by high yellow flames and the noise of crumbling structures, shattered buildings, and walls yielding to the heat’s pressure. The firefighters arrived at midnight. Once the fire was put out, they found the building hadn’t been used or visited in days, or even weeks. The plant, the mill and the lab seemed unscathed, except for some incinerated tables and some posters hanging on the walls, showing wheat varieties, maps of Mexico, and images of the city from the time when the rivers still crossed the neighborhoods. There was no equipment, no machines, no infrastructure to be saved, as if the factory had been purposefully abandoned later to be burned. [...]
Industry
in ENCYCLOPEDIA