Three horses that were stabled close to a burning building made it out safe as firefighters rushed to a structure fire in Nanoose Bay on the weekend.
The fire happened in the early-morning hours Saturday at a property on the Island Highway close to the Chevron station.
Denis Holme, training officer with the Nanoose Bay Volunteer Fire Department, said crews were called to a fully involved structure fire in a building with a metal roof and metal siding.
“The homeowner was alerted by a passerby on the highway, who found his way down … to the house and knocked on the door,” Holme said. “Shortly thereafter, one of the owners went and got the horses out, which was a big relief to us because the report that we were getting across our pager on the way to the structure was possible animals inside and nobody wants that.”
However, the horses were out and played in the pasture as crews fought the fire for hours in “a building that was pretty close to complete with its renovation, I think,” Holme said. “The fortunate thing was that there was nobody inside and apart from the structure itself, no major value inside the building.”
He said there are no fire hydrants on that side of the highway. Nanoose crews were at the scene for six hours and were assisted by Parksville and Errington crews.
Asked about a possible cause of the fire, Holme said the incident was turned over to the insurance company because there were multiple trades involved in the renovation project.
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