WINNIPEG — The Oak Park High School varsity football team says it’s heartbroken after finding its equipment up in flames.
After fundraising and collecting fees for years to buy new equipment for their football team, the Oak Park Raiders will be without equipment at practice on Monday.
Team Manager and Equipment Manager, Kristin Whittaker, said this is a sad day for the football program.
“At least $25,000 up in flames,” said Whittaker.
She explained that after spending three years fundraising for a new football field, the team was excited at starting on the new field next year with all of their new equipment. Now, they’ll have to borrow equipment from a different club until they can raise new funds to put towards new equipment.
Grant Park and Vincent Massey have both offered to lend their equipment to the Oak Park Raiders for the rest of the season.
The team has been practicing at Fraser Meadows while their field has been under construction. They kept a pod there with all of the equipment, including cones, balls, sleds, and more. However, when Whittaker arrived at Fraser Meadows she said all that was left was the shell of the porta-potty.
The Oak Park Football Program now has a GoFund Me page that’s been set up to help them raise money to replace the burned equipment.
No word yet on the cause of the fire.
Winnipeg Police Service said it has not been made aware of the situation at this time.
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