Red tape surrounded the remnants of three homes on a street in Fort Saskatchewan, Alta. Thursday morning, after fire ripped through the properties.
Three houses in the Westwood Pointe neighbourhood were destroyed and a number of others damaged by the blaze.
One house was burned to the ground. All that was left was a pile of ashes and debris. On either side of that property stood what remained of two other homes; crumbling, charred two-storey houses.
By the time fire crews arrived on scene shortly after 12:34 a.m., the three homes were already burning.
“When the 911 call was called in it was well on its way,” Fort Saskatchewan Acting Deputy Fire Chief Doug Stein said.
“When you get here, at that point, you just try to keep it from spreading any further and that was our biggest challenge as a group.”
There were at least 25 firefighters battling the blaze. Crews from Strathcona County were also called in to help.
“A member lives close so they had seen it on scene and noticed it was fully involved at that time and passed that information along,” Stein said. “When our responding units came, they had a call in to Strathcona for back up… knew that we had something big.”
Still, the siding of homes nearby melted from the heat.
No one was injured in the fire, but the Red Cross is helping the residents find somewhere to stay.
“It was nerve-racking with all of these houses being so close together,” neighbour Lucas Kwashuk said. “It’s lucky it wasn’t two days ago when it was really windy or else we would have been really hooped in this neighbourhood.”
Investigators were on scene later Thursday morning.
Damage could be as much as $2 million.