Nine days after a man intentionally crashed his car into the Middlesex Hospital emergency room entrance and set himself on fire, the facility will reopen after construction that repaired more than $550,000 worth of damage, according to an article on The Middletown Press website.

While the fire was contained to the lobby, the entire ER was affected. Water and smoke damaged about 90 percent of the area’s walls.

The entire 24,400-square-foot department was covered in at least an inch of liquid, he said.

“We had a massive job to clean up that water. We had to take and cut out all the sheet rock — from floor level to 28 inches above the floor — dry out and reinstall the sheet rock, tape, paint and get everything back in shape,” Jonathan Bankoff, chairman of emergency medicine said. “When drywall gets wet, it soaks up water very quickly. Within about 24 hours, it turns to mold. Mold was a significant concern.”

Read the article.