ALBANY - A blaze in an underground pit Tuesday afternoon in Building 57 at the Allvac-Oremet metals plant sent smoke over southwest Albany before firefighters were able to locate it and extinquish it.

No one was injured.

The fire was reported at 3:36 p.m. and started after a hydraulic line broke, said Shannon Snippen, the Albany deputy fire marshal.

Because the fire was underground, it took firefighters until shortly after 4 p.m. even to reach the fire. The pit is "full of grease and oil," Snippen said. "It has electrical equipment in it."

Building 57 is on the north side of 34th Avenue, near Calapooia Street. Traffic continued to move on 34th Avenue during the fire, but the dead-end section of Calapooia was closed off.

Twenty-five people from the Albany Fire Department went to the scene, and when the fire went to a second alarm, the Corvallis Fire Department, Tangent Fire Department and Lebanon Fire District all sent help.

The Tangent Fire Department, Jefferson Rural Fire Protection District, Adair Rural Fire and Rescue and Philomath Fire Departments dispatched firefighters and medics to staff the Albany Fire Department stations to be available for emergency calls.

Allvac-Oremet is a sister company of Wah Chang. Both are subsidiaries of Allegheny Technologies Inc. According to the company's Web site, it is the world leader manufacturing rammed-graphite, titanium and zirconium castings.

No estimate of monetary damage or potential impact on production was immediately available.