Firefighters, not pictured, battle the Greenberg Smoked Turkey fire in Tyler on Saturday, Nov. 7, 2020.

Tyler firefighters and investigators are continuing their efforts to “piece together a timeline” after a Friday night explosion and fire at the world-famous Greenberg Smoked Turkeys, Inc. in Tyler.

Because of the fire, customer orders from the East Texas iconic factory have been halted for the time being, according to a message on the company’s Facebook page.

Crews first came to the facility at about 8:30 p.m. to see black smoke coming out of the freezer buildings and debris in the street. Multiple units responded that night, and new crews have come in to assist Saturday and into coming days.

Tyler Fire Marshal Paul Findley said early Saturday afternoon firefighters remained on the scene of the meat processing plant at 221 McMurrey Drive with fire actively burning inside.

Larry Harrison, who lives across the street from the plant, heard the sounds of the explosion from his home and came outside to see damages, smoke and debris scattered everywhere.

“I heard it all. There’s several explosions in there,” Harrison said. “It blew the door off and landed in the street over there. I was out here when it was all going on. A lot of smoke. It was all over the whole place.”

Findley said investigators have gathered videos and interviews over night and into Saturday. Findley believes it could be a day or two before investigators can go inside, adding the fire department is “still a ways from figuring (the incident) out.”

He noted that out of three fires within the city of Tyler Friday, Greenberg Smoked Turkeys had a lot of structural damage. Roll-up doors at the plant were blown off the hinges.

“The explosion aspect of it was fairly significant to do the damage that it did,” Findley said. “We’ll be able to get in there and take a look at what it did. Hopefully, it’ll all come together, but it’s very, very early right now.”

In a statement on the company’s Facebook, Greenberg Smoked Turkey said customer orders will be “temporarily suspended” because of the fire at the facility.

The announcement also expressed thanks for the well wishes and prayers from concerned customers and community members.

“We are extremely grateful that all of our employees are safe and healthy,” the company statement read. “Additional updates will be shared here and on our website.”

Findley explained the fire marshal’s office is working to obtain several sets of data in an effort to gain a better understanding of what happened at Greenberg.

“At this point, we’re just kind of looking at everything,” he said. “Thankfully out there, we’re doing a good job of putting a timeline together, but there’s just with different technologies and different things at our disposal we’ve got to make sure our clocks are matching up and making sure we’re apples to apples on comparing one set of data with another set of data.”