ARMSTRONG – An Armstrong couple is reeling after their wedding plans went up in smoke along with their home this weekend.
Sunday an early morning blaze caused significant damage to the house on Lockhart Drive where the couple had been planning to get married at the end of August.
Glen Goodridge woke up around 4:30 Sunday morning and saw a glow out his window.
He looked out to see the whole back balcony engulfed in flames.
“If we were asleep God knows what would have happened,” says Goodridge.
The couple was hosting friends and family that night but all seven people in the home and their dog were able to get out safely.
“We were very lucky to get everybody out,” says Goodridge.
The home was fully involved when fire crews arrived and sustained extensive damage.
Goodridge and his fiancé, Denise Sherwood, were just finishing up renovations to the house and had planned to get married in the backyard next month.
Now the charred deck is a horrible reminder of what happened.
“We want to get married,” says Goodridge standing in his backyard, “we’ve got to come up with a different place. We were going to get married right here underneath the tree.”
Firefighters were able to recover Sherwood’s wedding dress.
“In this situation if we can make something bad a little better then we will do what we can,” says Alastair Crick of the Armstrong Spallumcheen Fire Department.
The wedding gown suffered smoke damage, but Sherwood is optimistic it can be cleaned.
The couple did have insurance on their home but it could take the better part of a year for them to rebuild.
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