Fire sends two to hospital, destroys home
Two people were taken to hospital Saturday (May 7, 2022) after an early morning fire destroyed a home in Fenwick.
Amherst firefighters responded to the alarm, which was turned in just before 7 a.m. as a structure fire with people possibly still inside.
Driving to the scene, which was slightly more than nine kilometres south of Amherst, they could see black dense smoke billowing into the air.
Arriving on the scene, they found four residents from the home outside of the house. EHS paramedics took two of them to the nearby Cumberland Regional Health Care Centre in nearby Upper Nappan via ambulance. Both had suffered burns.
Firefighters also found flames shooting several metres into the air from windows located at the front and side of the structure. Smoke billowed from the eaves.
Firefighters initially attacked the fire from the outside. Eventually, crews worked their way to the inside of the building, entering from the front and back of the house, disappearing into the smoke as they entered.
They were hampered as a portion of the structure holding up the steel roof had collapsed into the building. The steel itself bowed, but did not fall into the house.
As they battled the blaze, flames began licking at a basement window. Firefighters smashed open the window and, working in conjunction with their peers inside the building had those flames out quickly.
To get at the flames in the attic, firefighters had to cut two holes into the wall at one end of the building through which they poured water onto the flames.
Firefighters from Springhill and Truemanville assisted in fighting the blaze, both inside the structure and shuttling water tankers to and from the scene.
The three tankers, one from each department, had to travel about four kilometres north to the nearest hydrant to fill up. Upon arriving back on scene, they dumped water into a portable pool that was set up on Highway 2, which was closed while the departments battled the blaze.
Water from the pool was then pumped by a pumper truck to the many lines used by firefighters to fight the flames.
Firefighters appeared to have the fire knocked down by about 9:30 a.m., though they were still inside looking for hot spots an hour later.
No firefighter was injured fighting the blaze.
The cause of the fire is under investigation.
