Vernon Performing Arts Centre staff member fights fire

Quick action by an employee managed to prevent a months-long shutdown of the Vernon and District Preforming Arts Centre.

Maintenance building supervisor Lee Belanger heard the fire alarm go off at around 7:15 a.m. on Sunday.

He found a couch on fire in the building’s green room.

The blaze triggered the sprinkler system, which flooded the green room, a kitchen and a hall used for rehearsals and special events.

Belanger fought the flames with a fire extinguisher. His quick action was credited for preventing a much larger disaster.

“It was lucky he found it when he did because just the material the furniture was made of, the foam is like solid gasoline so it could have accelerated very quickly,” said Jim Harding, the executive director of the Vernon and District Preforming Arts Centre Society.

“We have a fire prevention device called a deluge curtain which would have released and that would have flooded the stage and the seating area in the auditoriums so we would have been shut down for a good six months probably.”

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Belanger is modest about his role. In the moment, he was just trying to put the fire out as quickly as he could.

“I was just doing my job. Probably any Joe would do it too,” Belanger said.

The cause of the blaze is still under investigation. Interestingly, Belanger was in the green room less than three minutes earlier and didn’t notice any issue.

“The fire inspectors are looking into… lighting fixtures, anything that could be a source of heat that might of triggered it. We are waiting for those final reports before we know anything more but we don’t believe anything left over from the night before concert or anything like that.”

The theatre was given the go ahead to continue with that night’s performance by the Okanagan Symphony Orchestra as long as they restored the sprinkler system, fire panel and faire alarms.

They expect scheduled performances in the theatre to go ahead as planned and restoration of the damaged area will likely go ahead next week.