‘Rewarding to know you helped out’: Area fire departments, agencies joined firefight

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This article was published 25/05/2018 (2901 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The massive fire in downtown Brandon last weekend was the first time in modern history that the city’s fire department had to ask for mutual aid from surrounding communities.

“We were extended pretty quick, and we recognized that the fire had (gone beyond) our capacity for our department to control and extinguish it,” fire Chief Brent Dane said in a recent presentation to city council.

Dane estimated it has been at least 70 years since a mutual aid call went out for Brandon.

“In some ways we felt like the big brother — this time we had to call,” he said.

Christie’s Office Plus went up in flames around noon on Saturday, and the blaze spread across the street to Massey Manor, a strip mall and a beer vendor/former nightclub.

Agencies that stepped up to help last Saturday included fire departments from Souris-Glenwood, Oakland-Wawanesa, CFB Shilo, as well as Manitoba Hydro and the Office of the Fire Commissioner.

Dane said there were a total of 35 staff from outside agencies fighting the fires. Combined with Brandon personnel, there were upwards of 60 firefighters.

“Logistically, it was a huge task for us to manage. It’s not something we do every day,” he said.

Dane said he was proud of the work that was done and the collaboration of agencies.

Dennis Gullett, fire chief of the Wawanesa and District Fire Department, said his volunteer crew of 10 firefighters had no hesitation when they got the call for help. They arrived in Brandon at approximately 3:15 p.m., and stayed on scene until about 7:45 p.m.

“As much as you read about the chaos, it was handled very well by Brandon fire department,” he said. “They did a great job of co-ordinating everybody that came in and put us in the areas they needed us, and we tried to help out the best we could.”

The Wawanesa unit was split between the beer vendor on Rosser Avenue and the Collyers building on Pacific Avenue.

“As firefighters, you never want to see people lose their property and their livelihood, but to be a fire department and be able to come and help and serve the community, it’s a great thing,” Gullett said. “It’s rewarding to know you helped out.”

The Souris-Glenwood volunteer fire department brought in six firefighters and one pumper truck to help with the response.

Fire Chief Brian Parham said he was south of Souris filling up the seeder on the farm when he saw smoke. His received a text from his son that Christie’s was on fire.

Parham called to see if Brandon needed their help. Initially, they didn’t, but were called in a short time later.

“I made two or three phone calls and off we went,” he said.

The Souris crew arrived on scene shortly before 3 p.m. and Parham said they were a “bit awestruck” just to see how many buildings were on fire.

“Once we got there we helped set up a couple lines, and we were assigned to look after the beer store and nightclub — do one of the corners and pump water on the existing fire and watch for exposure,” he said.

Parham has been with the Souris fire department for the past 35 years, and in that time, they have never been called to Brandon.

“It’s an unfortunate situation, but from a mutual aid standpoint it was one of those things where all the partners in the district got a chance to work together,” he said.

CFB Shilo provided 10 personnel, along with one pumper truck, a tanker truck, rescue vehicle, and the station pick-up truck. The OFC provided a ladder truck and four staff.

Manitoba Hydro personnel were on scene quickly, and two separate power lines had to be taken out of service. This created an outage that impacted more than a thousand customers. The natural gas supply line was also shut down in the area. Manitoba Hydro provided a pumper and five staff.

“A lot of our staff are trained as firefighters, particularly those who work in our generating stations, because a lot of these places are in remote areas. So if a fire breaks out they have the training and equipment to put it out,” said Bruce Owen, Manitoba Hydro spokesperson. “So we had staff not only looking after the electrical and natural gas side of things, but we also had people on the ground with hoses.”

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