The residents of Purcell View Apartments had an eventful evening last week when a resident smelled smoke in the building shortly before midnight on Tuesday Feb. 25.
The resident pulled the manual fire alarm, bringing the Golden Fire Department over to investigate at the 12th Street South building.
“We arrived on scene very shortly after the alarm was activated…I saw that there was smoke inside the building,” said Fire Chief Ken McClure.
While the chief was investigating what turned out to be a blown fuse that was generating a lot of smoke (most of which was contained in the electrical room), the residents of the seniors housing complex had to be evacuated from the building.
“The residents were never in real danger as the electrical service did exactly what it was designed to do,” said McClure.
“Whatever was introduced into the energized electrical circuits, the fuse blew, and that eliminated any fire problem after that because it got rid of the electrical energy. However when a fuse like that blows, it creates a lot of smoke.”
Extra vehicles (from the fire department, BC Ambulance and RCMP) were brought to the location to keep the residents warm and comfortable while the building was being inspected.
“When we were able to determine that the building was safe, we moved everyone back inside to their meeting room, and then we started repairs,” said McClure.
“It was important that we were able to keep everyone warm and comfortable while they were waiting.”
An electrician was brought in right away to make the repairs, and all of the residents were able to return to their rooms that same night.
The event was a bit disruptive for the residents, some of whom were on oxygen or had taken some night time medication. It was about two hours out of their night, however McClure says all the residents were patient, understanding and grateful to the department for the assistance.
“The guys did a really good job, we had between 15 and 18 firefighters on scene in under three minutes from the time of the alarm,” he said.
“This is a good news story.”
