By Tabitha Evans Moore | EDITOR & PUBLISHER

LYNCHBURG, Tenn. — No one was hurt. It’s completely contained. And it could have been a lot worse. These are the collective sentiments of Jack Daniel’s officials, local law enforcement, and environmental folks The Times spoke to throughout the day on Monday after a warehouse located behind The Jack Daniel’s Distillery’s South Bottling Plant partially collapsed early Monday morning.

According to local EMA records, locals officials were called to 1926 Fayetteville Highway around 5:50 a.m. in response to the partial collapse. There were no Jack Daniel’s employees inside the structure at the time of the collapse, which involved just the back corner of the building and not the entire structure.

Local officials were called in after a fire alarm activation at the warehouse likely caused by a severed fire suppression line caused by the collapse. That alarm also triggered the Distillery’s standard protocol for contacting local EMA for support, according to Svend Jansen, Jack Daniel’s Global Public Relations Director.

”Thanks to the quick response by the Jack Daniel Distillery team, we have the spill contained with minimal runoff,” Jansen told The Times. Both Jack Daniel’s Fire Brigade and Metro Moore County EMA responded to the incident.

Distillery tours and operations continued as normal after the event.

{EDITOR’S NOTE: This is an ongoing story that will be updated as more details become available. It was last updated at 10:52 a.m. on February 11.}

Less than 3,000 barrels spilled

At 10:43 a.m. Monday morning, Jack Daniel’s officials released a public statement.

“Overnight, there was a partial collapse of a Jack Daniel Distillery barrel house in Lynchburg, TN. No individuals were inside the barrel house at the time and there were no injuries to any employees. We are working with distillery and local officials to assess the damage,” the statement said.

The warehouse in question was one of the older style warehouse located behind what locals calls Tract 2 at the distillery. This structure, known to staff as Barrel House 2-15, was built in the late 1960s and had the capacity to hold approximately 19,000 barrels of maturing whiskey, according to Distillery officials. Barrel House 2-15 looks similar to one of the iconic warehouses that locals and tourist see sprinkled behind the historic Lynchburg Square at Jack Daniel’s main campus. It’s is not one of the palettized warehouses that exist along the Lynchburg Highway as you head towards Mulberry.

According to Jansen, approximately 15 percent of the barrels stored in the warehouse were involved in the partial collapse, though they were unclear at press time exactly how many actual barrels were involved. Some local officials estimated that number at under 3,000 barrels.

Distillery officials report they were able to contain the whiskey spill mostly to the site of the collapse, but emphasized that they were working with all appropriate government agencies to remediate this incident. •

{The Lynchburg Times is a locally owned and locally operated community newspaper in Lynchburg, Tennessee. We’re the only newspaper that publishes editions twice a week every Sunday and Wednesday as well as breaking news as it happens. It’s also one of the few women-owned newspapers in the state. We’re supported by both readers and community partners who believe in independent journalism for the common good. You can support us by clicking here. }