Rural Olds resident Cornel Van’t Klooster was having his morning coffee on Feb. 16 when he saw a shocking sight — the dairy operation's garage was on fire.
“I was doing the same thing as most people do at 6:15 in the morning. I was having a coffee in my kitchen,” Van’t Klooster said.
Van’t Klooster called the fire department and 18 minutes later emergency services arrived on the scene and started work on putting the fire out.
He's grateful for how quickly they responded.
As is reported elsewhere in the Albertan, 29 firefighters fought the blaze with water tanker support from the Bowden, Innisfail and Didsbury fire departments .
Upon arrival emergency services were met with frigid weather conditions that Van’t Klooster recalled being -28 C with 40- to 50-kilometre winds.
On the scene was the Olds Fire Department safety code officer Jamie Vasseur who told the Albertan about the challenges that come from fighting a fire in those conditions.
“The biggest issue is freezing up. So when you add water to the mix, and, and steam with the flames and you're standing downwind, you get a whole bunch of steam in your face.
"The masks will start freezing up our breathing apparatus, the regulator freezes up, and it just makes it very difficult to see and to get the mask off to get some fresh air when you're going in for what we call a rehab,” Vasseur explained.
It took four hours for the fire department to completely put out the fire, which Vasseur says is “adequate,” given the weather conditions.
“It took a little longer to put out all the hot spots for a building that size. Four hours to do a complete overhaul and make sure everything is out is pretty adequate,” said Vasseur.
“We had to recycle through firefighters just because we were freezing up and you know in that extreme cold you need to take a little bit of a break,” he said.
Van’t Klooster is grateful for the work that the fire department did putting out the fire and saving his house.
“I thought they did an awesome job. They were very professional,” Van’t Klooster said. “I am impressed with the response time. I’m not that far out of town, I realize that, but they responded very quickly.”
The cows and dairy farming facilities are 300 feet away from the garage that burned down and were completely unaffected by the fire.
