Oregon Public Broadcasting

1700 tons of hay burned Monday afternoon in a commercial hay compressing factory in Moses Lake, in Eastern Washington.

The fire started Sunday. The factory is important because it prepares hay from the Northwest for export to Korean dairy cows and even Middle East camels and race horses. Correspondent Anna King reports.

Thirty-two-year-old Shawn Clausen, farms in Warden, Washington. He's been sending his hay to this hay processing facility for five years.

Now he's in limbo. Clausen says he's just getting ready to cut down and ship his crop for the fourth time this summer. And he doesn't know where he's going to send it.

Shawn Clausen: “It's going to be a loss to the hay farmers around here if we don't have that facility to ship to in the next few months.”

Like Clausen, many Eastern Washington farmers are upset about the Moses Lake hay fire. It means that they'll have to ship their crop further away for processing, or stack their bales and wait.

There's no estimate of the damage and officials are still investigating the fire.