Blaze in Ameliasburgh involves two homes, vehicle

Prince Edward County firefighters will remain at the scene for most of the day today extinguishing hots spots from an early morning blaze involving two homes and a vehicle on County Road 19, near Juniper Lane in Ameliasburgh.

Deputy Fire Chief Robert Rutter said the call came in just before 5 a.m. Firefighters from Stations 5, 8 and 9 (Rossmore, Carrying Place and Ameliasburgh) were dispatched along with the aerial truck and the tanker from Picton Station 1.

“The first crews on scene had two fully involved structure fires, so now we’re not worrying about one building, but two, so we had to call Station 6 (Consecon) staffing and trucks and also called for water support from Station 7 (Wellington).

About 40 firefighters, battling the blaze and strong wind, got the fire under control in nearly two hours.

The families in the homes were able to get out of the structures and there were no injuries reported.

The fire is believed to have started in the garage of the first home, and was carried by wind to the home next door. There was also concern about nearby propane tanks.

“This morning the wind was very strong from the southeast and drove the fire into the house next door to the point that when we arrived, the house roof next door was also totally involved,” said Rutter.

While it wasn’t raining when the fire was active, early morning thunderstorms hindered efforts to continuing working on hot spots.

“Thunderstorms hinder efforts because we have to shut down aerial operations – bring the boom down from the aerial truck because safety is our number one concern,” said Rutter.

In Wednesday morning’s driving rain, firefighters were dousing hot spots while Paul Greer Excavating was removing the second home’s roof.

Rutter noted it appeared there was a steel roof installed on top of the original steel roof, creating difficulty in getting to the hot spots sandwiched between.

Having Greer Excavating bring down the roof was saving firefighters a lot of time in manual removal efforts, Rutter noted, and made it much easier for the aerial truck to douse hot spots once they were exposed.

Because of the intensity of blaze, Rutter expects the firefighters will be on scene for most of the day. Estimates on damage are yet to be made.