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MOUNDSVILLE, W.Va. (AP) -- Crews on Sunday used a helicopter to inspect a 100-story-high power plant smokestack, one of several precautions officials say must be taken before rescuers will be allowed to search for the body of a worker presumed dead inside.
"Our primary concern is to locate the individual who is missing," American Electric Power spokeswoman Carmen Prati-Miller said Sunday night. "The fire has been extinguished but we are still not going inside the stack. We don't know his location and we don't want to get anybody else hurt."
Sunday's helicopter inspections confirmed that the stack liner has been destroyed and that the structure on top of the stack has been partially damaged, Columbus, Ohio-based AEP said in a news release. A complete review of the inspection tapes likely will take a few days, AEP said.
"Large amounts of debris are lying in the base of the stack," the company said.
The missing man was one of several who were installing a fiberglass lining inside the concrete stack when the fire started Saturday evening at AEP's Kammer-Mitchell plant. The workers are employed by Pullman Power LLC of Kansas City, Mo. Three other workers at the top of the stack were trapped for two hours above the flames before a dramatic police helicopter rescue.
Pullman engineers will determine when it will be safe for crews resume a search, Prati-Miller said.
"All indications are it is a fatality," Marshall County Sheriff John Gruzinskas said Sunday. The victim's name was being withheld until his body is found, although police spoke to his wife Saturday night.
"It was very traumatic for her," Gruzinskas said. "She has two small children and is seven months pregnant. We are working to get counseling for her."
The workers were identified as David Earley, 29, of New Matamoras, Ohio; Jay McDonald, 59, of Kanab, Utah; and Timothy Wells, 36, of New Martinsville, Gruzinskas said. McDonald was in good condition Sunday at a Pittsburgh hospital, while Earley and Wells were treated and released, a hospital spokeswoman said.
Wells' wife, Melody Wells, called her husband her miracle and his rescuers heroes. She was at a basketball game with the couple's three children when the fire started.
"I can't even put it into words," said told WTRF-TV. "It was just excruciating, waiting for someone to call and let us know that he was OK.
"He wanted off there as soon as possible, and he was praying and thinking about me and the kids."
Calls to Wells by The Associated Press were not immediately returned Sunday. Messages left at listings for Earley, McDonald and Pullman Power also were not immediately returned.
Gruzinskas said he was amazed by the rescue with a Maryland State Police helicopter, which lowered a bucket to lift each worker out individually. West Virginia officials had requested the helicopter.
"I just couldn't imagine a rescue in daylight under the best of conditions," he said. "Here the stack is on fire, it's dark, and you've got three guys hanging onto it."
What sparked the fire has not been determined, Prati-Miller said.
AEP and Pullman officials, along with representatives from the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration and state agencies, were at the site Sunday.
AEP is upgrading the coal-fired power plant to bring it into compliance with federal air pollution regulations. The plant is south of Moundsville and about 68 miles southwest of Pittsburgh.
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
