The building's roof could be seen to have tilted backward from the front and the northernmost side of the building was puffed outward. Piping to an outside installation used to dispose of sawdust could also be seen to have disconnected.
Mike Beasley, plant manager at Klipsch’s 137 Hempstead 278 location, said he and other employees were alerted Sunday morning about the damage. “It was early a.m. that Sunday morning. Everybody got out here about 8:30 that morning.”
No workers were hurt in the collapse, Beasley said, adding that no one is now allowed into the building and engineers will be expected on the scene soon to assess its condition. “The First thing we preach I safety. So right now we don’t let anybody go into the building. We’ve got structure engineers, we’ve got all kind of engineers to assess the problem, and then we'll go from there.”
Whether or when the building will be reoccupied and the part of the production process housed in the building will restart, Beasley said, was yet to be determined but he expressed confidence it would be back up again soon: “Klipsch is a heritage part of Hope, Arkansas and Gentex is a great company to work with and they’re helping Klipsch tremendously in getting everything set back up and getting us back going.”
