EAGLE PASS, Texas — M&B Metal Products’ hanger-manufacturing plant in Piedras Negras, Mexico, is operating at full capacity after sustaining severe damage last Tuesday, when a killer tornado ripped through the border town.
High winds tore part of the roof from the plant, leaving its storage area exposed. No machinery was damaged, however, and the plant was able to resume full production this week with only minor “hiccups” due to power outages and surges. The company’s distribution center — only nine miles away in Eagle Pass — was unaffected.
As a result, the company expects no interruptions to shipments. “If the storm had happened two months earlier,” says company president Milton Magnus, “most of our finished goods would have been in the factory instead of the distribution center, and the loss would have been much larger.”
The first ever recorded in Piedras Negras, the tornado claimed 10 lives and left hundreds homeless. No M&B workers were injured, but one person lost his home and several others suffered damage. A Catholic church near the M&B factory was completely destroyed.
M&B is working with insurers to put a tarp over the gap in the roof in case of rain and eventually repair an estimated $250,000 to $500,000 in damage. In the mean time, the plant floor can’t be cooled against the desert heat. “It’s a testament to how hard-working our people are that they got it open at all,” says sales manager Dwayne Gwaltney. “We’re making hangers.”
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