A family is safe after a fire ravaged their home on Russell Place near River Bend store in Port Alberni, Saturday afternoon (July 18, 2015).
“Nobody was in the house,” Port Alberni fire Chief Tim Pley said.
A bystander noticed fire on the exterior of the house and called 911. “When we arrived, fire was on the exterior and in the house,” Pley said. No cause for the fire had been determined yet.
Firefighters from Beaver Creek and Sproat Lake volunteer departments also responded.
“With light truss construction like this (the house) went up pretty rapidly.”
When they first arrived the fire was threatening a neighbouring house, so crews doused the side of that house with water and cut into the attic to make sure the fire had not spread. “We put a lot of effort saving the neighbour’s house,” Pley said.
“Once the house was secure our next step was protecting the garage on the backside. The fire was a little ahead of us each time.”
They were able to knock down the fire by around 5 p.m. and managed to salvage “a fair amount of belongings,” Pley said.