Quick response time from Campbell River fire crews is being credited for putting out a blaze before it got much worse.
At around 6:00 pm yesterday (Wednesday), deputy fire chief Kelly Bellefleur says the fire department was called to a cedar shake mill on Willis Road. A front-end loader on the property had caught on fire.
Bellefleur says a fire truck left #1 Firehall to find the loader fully engulfed in flames. He tells My Campbell River Now the fire had then started spreading to the ground.
“There was of course wood chips and stuff on the ground, and it got some vegetation burning which was up against the building, so it was threatening that building,” he says. “A large diesel tank that was on site as well was being impinged by flame.”
Bellefleur continues, “So we had a second truck come out of #1 Hall that supported the first, and one truck out of #2 station as well that joined in. Those three fire crews managed to take care of the fire.”
All in all, a total of 15 firefighters were on scene, and Bellefleur says they managed to keep the nearby building from catching on fire.
“By the time they got alerted of the call, they were on scene in six minutes. This made all the difference in the world,” he explains. “If that fire had been ten minutes farther down the road, that would have been a completely different situation than we were dealing with.”
Bellefleur says no one was hurt. He says the damage was contained to the loader, summing it up as a ‘complete loss’.
“It appears to have been started in the engine compartment on the loader,” Bellefleur adds. “That’s all we know at this point.”
CR Fire crews respond to a front end loader that was fully involved at a cedar shake mill on Willis Rd. Quick action by firefighters stopped the fire from spreading to the Mill and surrounding area. A quick response is critical in any emergency. Response Times Matter!
— Campbell River Fire (@RiverCityFire) July 15, 2021
Meanwhile, earlier this week, Campbell River firefighters extinguished two brush fires. On Monday at 3:30 am, crews say a vehicle fire spread to the brush near Cranberry Lane. Then, close to an hour later at 4:26, a brush fire broke out behind Cedar School. Both fires were contained quickly by fire crews.
