A turkey barn caught fire early Wednesday morning in Vulcan County, destroying the building and killing 9,000 chicks.
Vulcan County Emergency Services say they received a call at 2:28 a.m. on Sept. 25, indicating a structure was on fire.
Upon arrival, crews found a metal frame building completely engulfed in flames, with no hope of saving the structure.
“We had a three-department response there. Our first arriving unit did report a fully-involved turkey barn fire and at that point it became a defensive operation,” said Douglas Headrick, regional fire chief and director of protective services with Vulcan County. “There was nothing left to save.”
While Headrick confirmed no humans were injured in the blaze, the destruction was not without significant loss of life.
“Talking with the operators of the facility, it was 9,000 two-week-old turkeys that were inside. They had just taken delivery of them two weeks ago,” said Headrick.
According to Farmtransparency.org, turkeys are typically slaughtered at 10-17 weeks old. With Thanksgiving right around the corner, these turkeys were not likely to be available for purchase yet, though they would have been available in time for Christmas.
Headrick says it took crews several hours to finally beat the blaze, but they were successful in stopping the flames from spreading to nearby buildings.
“From the time they arrived to the time they cleared the scene was roughly four hours.”
There is not yet an estimate on the cost of the damage, though Headrick says the building is a complete write-off.
The barn was located on a farm northeast of Vulcan, a town in southern Alberta. To protect the privacy of the landowners, Global News is not disclosing the exact location.
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.