Commerical fire contained by sprinkler system

An early morning fire in a commercial building was extinguished by a sprinkler system, according to the Yuma Fire Department.

Just after midnight Monday, a fire was reported at Johnson Controls at 3749 Arizona Ave., a plant that manufactures batteries, the fire department said in a news release.

The building's automatic sprinkler system had put out the fire by the time firefighters arrived, the news release said.

Firefighters shut off the sprinklers and evacuated the accumulated smoke, the release said.

The cause of the fire was a heating element in a large machine used to wash batteries, according to investigators. Smoke alarms and sprinklers alerted three employees to the fire.

There were no injuries reported.

Damage is estimated to be in the thousands of dollars, but the sprinklers contained the fire to just one machine in the multimillion-dollar facility, the release said.

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William Roller can be reached at

wroller@yumasun.com or 539-6858.