Fire at New York AI Data Center Exposed Safety Gaps, Fire Chief Says

A fire broke out in early June in an unfinished building at the Lake Mariner data center in Somerset, New York, leaving local firefighters facing conditions they were unprepared for, Ars Technica reports.

Crews reportedly found no working alarm, no suppression system, and three dead hydrants. Safety documents they are legally entitled to see had reportedly burned in the blaze.

Steve Matisz, chief of the Barker Fire Department, said his crew entered "kind of blind," facing heavy black smoke from chemicals they could not identify. "It's been a difficult situation," he said. He was unsure what to make of the claim that the safety sheets had burned.

The $3.2 billion campus sits on a former coal mine on Lake Ontario. TeraWulf owns and operates the data center on land leased from a company owned by its own CEO; Fluidstack will run the center; Google holds warrants for a future 14 percent equity stake and has agreed to guarantee Fluidstack's lease payments; and Anthropic is among the AI companies whose compute demand the facility serves.

TeraWulf said it is responsible for operational safety and emergency preparedness at the campus, including required safety systems and coordination with first responders. Chief strategy officer Kerri Langlais said the company implemented Knox boxes, additional hydrants, and safety data sheet "go-bags" after an after-action review with the county.

By mid-August, Matisz said a Knox box representative had visited the site with a meeting scheduled. On hydrants, he was direct: "As far as I know, [they] are still dry... I haven't seen work done on them."

Source: Ars Technica