Tuesday, October 10, 2006
Thanksgiving Day Bale Fire
Unfortunately, rural life on the prairies isn't without perils. This fire started Monday afternoon, Oct 9th on Thanksgiving Day, at a nearby Linden, Alberta farm. I had looked outside the window to see spiraling billows of black smoke coming from near our old farm over the hill. The phone rang...it was my husband's sister calling for him to get over there quick and help out. The farm/feedlot belonged to her husband's family and their huge straw bale stack had caught on fire from sparks blown from their still smoldering garbage pit. The wind had been brisk that afternoon.
About 100 people, 4 water trucks, 3 fire engines, and a dozen farmers drove their bale tractors over to help salvage some of the bales before the fire consumed everything, but the wind had blown the fire very quickly from one end to the other and only 50 of the 2000 bales were saved. The rest of that year's work was gone... all $40,000 worth up in smoke. No-one was hurt, no barns or houses burnt down...that was the good news.
My young 11 year old son, Jamie, had brought his digital camera along. He took the pictures shown above, showing only a fraction of the bales burning. It became difficult to see anything else behind this end as it was quite a huge amount of smoke. The bales continued to burn an eeriely orange glow even in the dark of midnight. The firemen and volunteers had stayed with the bales all night until extinguished early this morning.
Thank heavens for a caring, strong knit community.
Labels: farm, fire, prairies, rescue, straw
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That is so sad. It would have been horrible to see all the hay gone. I know when all my hay is in for the winter it is a content feeling. My heart goes out to them.
Spoke and I saw the smoke here in Three Hills, and wondered what was burning. We shot up prayers, knowing it must be a big fire. I'm glad nobody was hurt.
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