One Westlock County family is homeless following a chimney fire that spread and destroyed their home.
Westlock Rural fire chief Drew Beattie said his department received the call about a chimney fire in a log house at around noon on Thursday, Nov. 15 at a property west of town on Range Road 273, south of Highway 18.
When they arrived, the fire had already caused the chimney to fall off the building, and had spread into the roof structure.
Beattie said the official cause of the fire remained under investigation on Friday morning, but homeowner Andy Luchka said the fire started because the furnace was not working that morning.
Luchka said he had lit the fireplace for some heat, and later noticed extra smoke coming from the chimney. He managed to put out the fire in the fireplace, but it was too late; the fire was already established in the chimney.
In the course of fighting the blaze, members from the Pickardville, Busby and town fire departments also arrived on scene to provide assistance.
It took firefighters about 90 minutes to get the fire under control, Beattie said. The sun had set before they had completely extinguished the fire and any remaining hot spots, he added.
No one was injured.
Beattie said he wants to remind people that there are many important and simple things they can do to protect themselves in the event of a fire. The two simplest are to have working smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detectors installed in the house, and to have an escape plan in place in case you need to exit quickly.
Another is to know the address of the building you’re in.
“Knowing your address is a big thing as well,” he said, adding that extends to any building you’re in, not just your home.
In this case, the address the department was given was exact, but in the past there have been instances where the exact address has not been known.
“It just saves time overall if we can have the exact location right off the bat and we know exactly where we’re going,” Beattie said, going on to say the address determines which department ultimately gets the call.
Another request Beattie has is for onlookers to stay far from the scene so firefighters have enough space to do their jobs.
“We need people to give the fire departments room to work and not crowd the entrances and the roadway leading up to the scene,” he said. “The trucks are big, the roads are not, and we need room to manoeuvre.”
